


Bird Nerds in Love

by legendarytobes



Series: Gemelo [6]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: AU, Alternate Season Five, Alternate Universe, Angst, Canon Divergence, F/M, Michaella, Romance, Virgin Michael, romcom, season five, the fourteen-billion-year-old virgin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:54:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26090707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/legendarytobes/pseuds/legendarytobes
Summary: Ella and Michael are growing closer in their relationship, but Ella's still bothered by transparent lies and the things about Michael and his twin that don't quite add up. Only one thing left to do---Science the shit out of everything.
Relationships: Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar, Ella Lopez/Michael
Series: Gemelo [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1832677
Comments: 170
Kudos: 267





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I started the Gemelos series before season five came out so this is a very, very AU interpretation of a (honestly) nicer Michael. Best to read parts 1-5 first or this won't make much sense.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Image Links:
> 
> 1) Story Banner - https://ivyquinnauthor.tumblr.com/post/632804752085942272/a-commissioned-work-from-the-very-talented
> 
> 2) Full Chapter 1 image - https://ivyquinnauthor.tumblr.com/post/632804867169222656/full-image-of-the-scene-from-the-artist
> 
> Work done by the fabulous Yami-no-Takemaru (see some of her art here - https://archiveofourown.org/works/26940889/chapters/657509320)

Chapter One

Ella dug into her cotton candy with gusto. The last month had been fun. Nice. All that good stuff she’d thought about over the years, and things she’d remembered from her time in college with Frederico. This silly stuff she liked the most, just holding hands and walking around the art houses and theaters and crazy boutiques near her neighborhood, chilling on her sofa and watching movies together and, okay, she was totally getting into the Bogie and Bacall old school stuff, and enjoying getting him up to speed on _Star Wars_. Well, except for the prequels. She was dreading having to rewatch _Attack of the Clones_. Sand was so coarse. God, why did Lucas get paid to write that?

Not that she was counting or bitter. Nope, no siree, not Ella, and not like twenty plus years later, not at all.

However, it was sweet and mostly easy dating Michael. As much as she adored Lucifer as the big brother she _wished_ she’d had, and as much as she appreciated him trying to be her wingman of sorts, Ella found that her relationship with Michael went better when neither she nor he listened to Lucifer’s advice. The so-called Devil’s thoughts and plans worked great for him. But they’d made a mess of what she and Michael had been trying to do.

Then again, considering how long it had taken Deckerstar (great name, she was proud of coining it) to seal the deal, maybe she and Michael just needed to wear ear plugs around Luce. Great sex he apparently knew about (she’d been at the precinct with like the ninety plus people for that one month, wow), but relationships…well, Ella was pretty sure his twin was already lapping Lucifer in that department.

She was halfway done her sugary treat as Michael wind-milled his left shoulder near her. He was warming up. Ella hadn’t asked him to try and do the strong man challenge on the board walk. Dear Big Guy, no. She knew that wouldn’t go well. At all. However, they’d been enjoying the Santa Monica pier, and she’d already won him a present with the arrow shooting game. Seriously, she’d maybe crushed hard on Legolas in college and done a semester of archery as an elective. It was enough to win even a rigged game here. Besides, there was something adorable about the fluffy, plush chicken Michael had chosen for himself. He hadn’t exactly named it Margaret, but she figured he’d be taking it back to his place to compliment his spreadsheet sheets.

Well, now Michael thought he needed to return the favor and win something for her. Which was flattering, but she knew…she just didn’t want him to set himself up for disappointment. Besides, she had, perhaps in a glitch of common sense, invited Chloe and Lucifer along (after checking with Michael first), and Chloe had half a zoo in her arms after the games of chance. To be fair, Lucifer had only won about two-thirds of those. Anything he deemed too messy for his suit, he’d simply charmed the carnies into giving him something.

It was kind of cheating, but the dude could talk so…it seemed to work.

Again, not like these games weren’t rigged anyway.

But now, because brothers were competitive and twins were extra competitive, Ella was watching Michael step up to the plate. So to speak. He had finished working out his good shoulder and eyed the board walk attendant before him.

“I’m ready for the mallet.”

The guy with the faux hawk had actually let them take a lot of time, and Ella suspected it had to do with Lucifer and whatever “extra” he’d added. Fine by her too. She was probably supposed to care more when her friend either mojo-ed people (as Chloe called it) to get his way or bribed people. She didn’t. Most of the time, Ella enjoyed Lucifer as a partner and brother in idiocy. It was fun. Chloe and Michael could fun police if they wanted.

  
She just wasn’t sure why it was _this_ event Michael had chosen to win for her.

It wasn’t like Ella needed a giant plush neon bunny or elephant of her choice. Nope. Although, if it was a bunny it would go so well with her bright turquoise peep.

Michael took the sledgehammer, and as she watched, Ella noted that he held it easily. She knew _for reasons_ that those things were pretty freaking heavy, even if you were basically a tree like the twins were. But it seemed to Mike, despite his shoulder and side, that the sledgehammer wasn’t bothering him at all. As if to prove his point, he swung it around in a wind-mill gesture again.

Lucifer chuckled. “Well, Brother, no time like the present, is there?”

Michael nodded and glanced at Ella long enough to give her a small, shy grin. She prized moments like that. He was so thoughtful and, often, still so mired in his own issues and the fears he was working out with Linda (or so Ella hoped) that even around her, unguarded happiness was rare. Whenever Michael looked less than pensive, it lightened her heart.

“I’ve got it, Sammy.”

“Sure, you do. I could just ask our young friend over here what he desires besides a crisp hundie.”

Ah, that explained it. Lucifer had _definitely_ bribed the kid with three nose piercings for all the time they needed. Ella eyed Chloe, who’s expression had gone a bit more pinched. She wasn’t really able to convey all of her anxiety in a glance, but she hoped Chloe got it, at least. If Lucifer in his expansive mood and, uh, his “brilliant” mind had thought of making sure Ella got a prize as part of the pay-off, that would not end well. Sweet as a gesture like that would be---and she really didn’t need a literal pink elephant anyway---it would sting if Michael realized even if he failed, he’d have been circumvented by his twin.

Chloe sighed. “Lucifer, it’s good. Hey, Michael, if you want to…any time now.” Her words might have sounded short, but she winked at Mike. “There’s still a few other rides to hit before Lucifer and I have to pick up Trixie.”

Michael nodded, and to Ella’s amazement, pulled his shoulder back high and slammed the head of the sledgehammer hard against the bottom of the game. The little bullet in the base rocketed up through the fake thermometer and, then, burst _through_ the top. Lucifer seemed to come out of nowhere to push her and Chloe out of the way before the little indicator crashed back to earth and, maybe a little, made a hole in the pier itself.

“ _Demonios_. What the hell was that?” Ella asked.

The carnie kid cursed a lot then. And it was a pretty creative string of epithets, she had to give him credit for that. “What the fuck man! That’s my family’s game. It’s been with us since the fucking sixties!”

Lucifer rolled his eyes even as he stood straight and reached into his pockets for his (on brand) pentagram money clip. “Yes, and how much will it cost to get that fixed?”

“Dude, he ruined it. We don’t even have the bullet anymore! It’s in the fucking Pacific!”

Ella frowned between Michael, who finally had the modesty to set the sledgehammer down, and Chloe, and both were looking at each other and doing that “having a whole conversation without words” thing. She’d never seen those two do it before, but she’d definitely seen Lucifer and Chloe do it dozens of times especially over the last year or so since she’d been back from Rome and at the lab.

The kid was still furious, but he got less red faced and shouty when Lucifer handed more bills than Ella could guess at him. “I…holy crap, that has to be twenty grand.”

“Oh closer to thirty, I’d wager,” Lucifer replied. “Now, if you could get my brother whichever animal he wants for his lady, that would be most helpful. Chop-chop.”

Michael was still having what had changed from intense looks to a glare off with Chloe when the kid called over to him. “Hey, uh, Mister? Which one do you want?”

Her boyfriend considered the question and then looked to the mounted displays of stuffed animals. He really was settling on the bright pink elephants, which, okay so not her style. “I’m not sure. Ella, which do you like?”

She sidled up next to him and threaded her arm through his good one. She’d have grabbed either, but he was so self-conscious about his weak side, that she tried her best not to draw extra attention to it. “The bright blue bunny looks so cool. He’ll go with my peep, Peppa, and is that good?”

Mike chuckled back at her. “You heard the lady. The biggest, bluest bunny here. And, really, I wasn’t exactly thinking straight.” He shot Lucifer a death glare. “My brother has that effect on me.”

The kid shoved the bunny at her. “Whatever dude, like that shit was crazy. My grandpa started this whole thing sixty years ago almost. _No one_ has ever broken the damn thing.”

Ella studied him closely. Yeah, she knew that Lucifer was really strong. The whole precinct had at least one story of Lucifer going ham on something. Considering how much broader he’d gotten in the last couple of years---and seriously she’d been surprised at the nudist colony thing that Luce had gotten so jacked---Ella could maybe consider with him steroids. However, Michael just…his right side was weaker, a bit shriveled for his arm and bad leg, probably from lack of consistent use or muscle damage or both. So she hadn’t really suspected he was as strong as Lucifer currently on the left.

  
Or apparently that he could break carnival games of chance.

That was definitely a new one on her and, seriously, what had just happened?

Michael seemed to finally recognize her scrutiny, and he sighed and hunched up a little, as if trying to shrink into the background. As if a guy his size could ever be the wallflower. Hell, as if a guy who just hammered the game into the stratosphere would blend away.

“I really am sorry,” Michael added.

The kid counted the bills Lucifer had given him and shoved most in one pocket and a good-sized chunk in his other. She knew that maneuver. Ricardo pulled punk moves like that. The carnie kid was skimming off his family business. Then again, he wasn’t still cussing out Michael, so it was progress.

“Look, dude, you broke it and he bought it. I figure we’re square.” He looked at Chloe and her menagerie of stuffed animals from all over the boardwalk. “Hey,” the kid added, looking back at Lucifer. “For all you did, your lady there can get a freebie stuffed animal prize. Would you like a rabbit?”

“Oh, I’m sure the Detective has one up in her bedroom; am I right, darling? It’s superfluous of course, but a Devil can’t always be everywhere.”

  
Chloe rolled her eyes. “No, not even kind of funny.”

Ella stopped herself from chuckling a little. “It was low-hanging fruit.”

“It’s _always_ low-hanging fruit,” Chloe joked good naturedly.

Michael slid his good arm around her shoulders and followed the lead of his brother and Chloe as they started down the board walk. Chloe was animatedly already moving onto any other subject and suggesting maybe some funnel cake next.

Her boyfriend blinked down at her and frowned. “But Chloe doesn’t have a pet bunny. So, I don’t understand about the rabbit.”

Lucifer was about to open his mouth when Ella beat him to it and described in rapid fire Spanish what would happen to him if he answered his brother’s confusion. The alleged Devil (and possibly the saddest method actor she knew) clamped his mouth shut and shook his head.

Michael gave a low whistle. “I am amazed.”

“What?” Ella asked.

“I never thought I’d see Sam find at least three women who could shut him up with a look. It’s nothing our parents were ever able to do. Home would have been _far_ quieter if they had been.”

“Oh, ha bloody ha, Mikey.”

“Let it go,” Chloe said. “Forget about the double entendres, Lucifer.”

Michael shook his head. “I still don’t get when a rabbit isn’t a rabbit.”

“It’s not worth it,” Ella supplied. “Oh, and please never Google that. Just, um, I’ll explain so much later.”

“Oh,” Michael replied.

Damn it, Lucifer couldn’t resist so many openings. Ugh, and now she was thinking in sex puns but still. He chuckled to himself and then added to his brother, “Yes, ‘o’ indeed since that’s the idea.”

Michael’s pace seemed to slow, and she squeezed his left hand. “Hey, no worries, let’s let Lucifer and Chloe do the funnel cake thing,” Ella offered. “I already had the cotton candy and this much sugar is so going to my thighs anyway.”

“I like them,” Mike added.

She blushed and, okay, maybe preened a little before him. “Sure, well, what do you want to do? Chloe did the roller coaster and Lucifer wanted games of chance, and I got to introduce you all to churros. So, what’s your poison, _corazón_?”

Michael considered that and glanced over her shoulder. “I…have you ever done the Ferris Wheel here?”

Ella gulped and the sweat was already covering her palms. Heights and her were so not mixy things. That story involved her, both Cesar and Alejandro, and a double dare that she could scale their fire escape blind folded. Um, she ended up okay, but spoiler alert? You couldn’t do that from the fourth floor with your eyes covered, or at least _she_ couldn’t. Ella had avoided heights ever since.

But he was looking back her with the wide, expectant eyes of giant Labrador. “It’s fun, right?”

She gripped his hand tighter and promised herself she’d make it. It was safe, and he was here, and she was so not going to be scared of a ride for kids. “Yeah, let’s do it to it.”

**

Okay, so she hadn’t meant to, but Ella had lied. Not to Michael because she’d gotten on the ride, but to herself. She thought she could just burrow into his side and not panic, but that wasn’t how it was going. Ella was trembling next to him and struggling to focus on just Michael’s face. Beside her, her boyfriend was studying her with those fathomless and piercing dark eyes of his.

  
That was the thing he shared the most with his twin. Both dudes could win any staring contest on the planet, she was sure. It was a little overwhelming.

“Are you okay? You’re trembling.”

Ella curled up against Michael, and some days she swore that his left side was sometimes like trying to cuddle up against steel. Clearly, Mike was stronger than she’d assumed, even with his right side troubles. That carnival worker and his family would either have to order a new machine or…yeah, they’d definitely be ordering a new one. Which, okay mondo weird.

Unless she was overthinking it.

Was she overthinking it?

Not too long ago, she’d accosted him with one big-ass, grey feather and accused him of being an angel. Her abuelita and her mamí were right. She was just _un montón de locuras_ , and she was lucky anyone ever bothered to date her at all. Ella was fine. Ella was _normal_ , and Ella would not ask her boyfriend how he broke a strength machine one-handed. It was sixty years old; maybe it was just its time.

“Ella? Are you okay?” he asked.

She shook a bit more and forced herself to focus on his face and not the fact that the pier was easily thirty feet or more below. Why was this fun again?

“Yeah, I…okay maybe I have a bigger fear of heights than I thought.”

Michael squeezed her shoulder and frowned. “I could have just…if you’d wanted, I would have skipped.”

“Well, we got to do what everyone else wanted. I didn’t want you to feel you weren’t getting your turn.”

Michael brightened at that, the rare smile that only she felt she got to see. Possibly Linda sometimes because Michael really enjoyed Charlie too. Every time he talked about his nephew, he got so excited. Every tiny milestone she learned from him. She wasn’t sure Lucifer paid the kiddo that much attention whenever he was over for family dinners.

Figured.

You could take playboy away from Lux, and get him totally into a cute situation with Chloe, but you couldn’t take it all out of him. Kids? Not really, though he was warming on Trixie. Babies for the so-called Satan of Sunset? Yeah, not at all.

“You were willing to be scared just so I could ride the Ferris Wheel?”

She rolled her eyes and breathed easier as they made a rotation to the ground. “Well, I didn’t want to be selfish.”  
  


He chuckled warmly at her words. “Ella, I don’t think you could ever be selfish. But next time, I can…well, I wouldn’t ride things with Sam because he’s annoying. But I can enjoy things on my own while you wait. I don’t want you to be scared near me.”

“I’m not! I’m scared of… _mierda_ …and we’re going back up again.” Her voice was getting shriller; she knew it. But she _hated_ heights. Frankly, the Detroit fire department still wasn’t thrilled from the time it had come out to rescue her idiot middle-schooler keister either. _Thanks Ricardo_. “I just maybe am not a roller coaster or Ferris Wheel or ooh a sling shot style ride. Not for me.”

“Then now we know.”

She frowned at him as he looked out at the pier and the ground before them. Despite his concern for her, he was smiling at the view. There were things she’d pieced together about Michael from what he’d told her---the things that weren’t actually lies---but she knew he’d been an accountant or done work in that arena on the east coast. She knew that he and Lucifer _clearly_ came from a big old cult no matter what they called living back home with their dad, and that Lucifer had once when they were younger hurt Michael horribly. Michael swore he’d given Lucifer almost as good as her friend had given, but Ella couldn’t see where or how. Honestly, even with their hyper competitive streaks and their sniping at each other, it was a miracle they got along as well as they did.

Especially since Michael, at first, had been dumb enough to mess with Chloe.

Lucifer was known to go all Chernobyl on stuff like that.

But he’d also mentioned a few things about war and strategy, and not in the way that she’d always thought of them when she was on a D&D campaign or out LARPing. The dude would mention things like he _knew_ them, and she wondered a little if before Lucifer had hurt him so, if Michael had been army. However, with the way he gazed at the sky and the view, the haunted and almost nostalgic look on his face…Ella wondered if she’d guessed wrong.

“Were you in the air force?” she asked. Then, when he didn’t answer right away, Ella kept blurting. “I mean, maybe you weren’t and I’m totally off base. I mean you and Amenadiel sound American and Luce is method, but maybe you’re from a different country wherever your family is from so it could be a huge leap but I was just…I dunno…trying to figure out why someone would like heights so much.”  
  


Michael blushed a little, and it was adorable. “Am I that transparent?”

She nodded. “You like the view as much as I’m quaking in my sneakers about it. So, am I right?”

“Once, I was in the service. I wasn’t here because, you’re not completely off base, and despite Sam’s affected accent---and he’s had many over the years, don’t let him fool you---my family’s not from here.”

“Ooh, so Lucifer could have had INS problems after all. Did he?”

Michael laughed and drew her closer to him. “Not at all. Family business is always complicated.”

“Yeah, I used to think me and all my brothers were messed up, but, honestly, you guys might come from a family crazier than mine. I can’t say I like your dad much. Everything Lucifer’s said sucks.”

“Well, Samael has his own take on everything. I…once I loved Father very much, but things changed. It was a rude awakening.”  
  


She nodded and sighed. She loved her dad desperately. Her mom and abuelita too. However, something had broken between her and her parents, something that never had quite healed over after her exorcism (that so didn’t work anyway). Whatever had happened with all three brothers and their dad sounded a fuck ton more complicated.

And sadder.

Although Amenadiel never talked about it the times she did see him, and he seemed to be an adoring and devoted father. Maybe he’d learned just by doing the exact opposite. Michael held it all deep down and tried never to bring it up with her, and Lucifer…well, he was so upset at his father that even if someone mentioned _God_ , Lucifer would complain about him.

“But wherever you’re from---” she said, letting it hang and hoping deep down that for once Michael would offer her a bit more about his past.

As she suspected, he did not.

However, he did continue on the military topic. “It’s not close to Los Angeles, not at all. But I was a soldier, and before…” Michael sighed. “…before Samael and I fought, I was very good at what I did, led my troops well.”

“So flying was involved? Oh my God, can you like fly a jet?”

Michael beamed back at her, pride evidently bubbling through him. This was rarer still than an unguarded laugh or smile. When he sat up like that, then, yeah, he did remind her a bit of his brother. It was nice to see him be able to be so confident in something he’d done. Sometimes, Ella worried he defined himself by his twin---both because Lucifer had hurt him and because he felt in L.A. still like he was just borrowing Luci’s friends.

As far as Ella was concerned, that was _not_ true, but it might take longer for the Deckers to come around, if Trixie and Chloe ever fully did, and, to be fair, they might not. Michael had lied at first.

Like a lot.

But as they made yet another rotation---and they had to be done soon right---Michael smiled broadly and spoke. “I was so good in the air. It was something I’d been born to do, and I was better than anyone else, even Sam.”

She blinked, trying to reconcile the _zorro_ of a friend she currently had, the, well, manwhore of a bestie, with an actual soldier. Try as she might, Ella could not get over the cognitive dissonance.

“Lucifer? Like your twin? He was in the air force or squadron or whatever you call it where you’re from?” She wanted to add pointedly that it was some Big Guy-forsaken country that seemed to be averse to phones and internet signals, but she wasn’t going to press.

“He was. Sammy was never disciplined. _Ever_. But he was strong and had a great instincts. He was almost as good as I was. If he had ever applied himself, he’d have been better.” Michael’s mood soured and his right shoulder hunched even higher. “We were, perhaps, too well matched, you know?”

“Cause you fought and…”

Michael nodded, and the ride finally came to a blessed stop. She stood first, hopped off, and smiled patiently as Mike eased off at a more leisurely pace. Ella neared the Ferris Wheel car door so that Michael could brace his left hand on her shoulder as he stepped down. They garnered a few stares because people could be total assholes---she remembered that well from her years of rehab on her leg---but screw them too. This was fine.

This was them.

“I’m sorry you two have spent a long time fighting.” She offered, even as she took his hand in hers and they walked to the souvenir shops.

Lucifer would not be caught dead buying anything there _for himself_ , but she knew him well enough to bet he was agonizing something to get not just for Chloe but for Trixie and, probably, something that was a prank to use against Dan too. She was pretty sure one of the stores was a magic shop that sold whoopee cushions and fart spray and…yeah, she was glad she was dating the other one. Lucifer was a good friend, but the living definition of high maintenance.

Then again, the fart spray would be funnier than just more pudding pranks…

“Sometimes I am too. I…at the end of the day, Father pitted Sam and me against each other, and it was as it was. I was doing what I was asked.”

“Yeah, and parents---”

“Can suck,” he said, winking at her and making her laugh as he borrowed her phrase. “But it’s okay for now.”

“But you still miss flying a lot, don’t you?”

Michael looked to the sky and sighed. “I can muddle through, but I suppose, ah, commercial is nothing compared to something more intense. I used to feel one with the clouds, and I can honestly say it’s been eons since I’ve felt like that.”

Ella sighed and led him to the souvenir stands and, like she often did these days, forced her keen forensics brain not to focus on the pieces that didn’t fit. She would not think of the broken carnival machine or the country the three brothers were from that they wouldn’t name or, most confusing of all, the way that the Lucifer she knew didn’t square with a soldier long ago who could have hurt Michael so badly. They all niggled at the back of her brain sometimes, but she would not let that bother her.

At least not today.

She was fine and not crazy, and Ella so was not going to accost anyone with feathers again. She’d ruined her shots in college. Damn it, her _locuras_ would not ruin this; Ella wouldn’t let them.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael continues therapy solo with Linda, and Lucifer needs help from his twin down at the station.

**Chapter Two**

“I didn’t mean for it to get as far as it did,” Michael admitted, reaching for the jellybeans in Linda’s jar on the coffee table in her office.

It was Monday.

He always had therapy on his own with her on Mondays. On Thursdays, he and Samael had a duo session. Those were the days where, if possible, he’d go to Ella’s after and camp out on her sofa. She always let him, and he wasn’t…they weren’t ready for the same bed even for just sleeping. It was setting up too much he wasn’t ready for, but after what felt like hours in session with Sam (even if it was just the standard 50 minutes Linda had with all her patients), Michael could never bear to be near him back at Lux. _Especially_ since Sam came and went into Michael’s apartment as the Devil pleased. On Sundays, they had family dinner as part of his recuperation and requirements, which Michael liked the best. It amused him to hear Sam and Amenadiel bicker---and it was oddly reassuring that some things stayed constant forever---and he enjoyed feeling like a family again. There had always been a messed up one with the Host, but with just the three of them and Linda and Charlie…it was nice.

Welcoming in a way things hadn’t been in the Silver City since before Father invented humans at all.

Linda regarded him, and she tried to keep her expression professional, and usually she excelled at it. However, she was also a mother. The fierce kind that Michael wished even now the Goddess had been for them. As much as their mother being on earth had meant to Sam and Amenadiel, as much as both of his brothers swore Mother was better…it didn’t really sound like it to Michael. He was relieved she had her own universe and wouldn’t--- _couldn’t_ \---cause trouble any longer on the earthly plane. If “better” meant she’d only plotted but hadn’t actually blown up Chloe’s car and almost but not actually self-detonated at the Santa Monica pier, rife with families and tourists having fun, then Michael didn’t want her around.

But yes, ninety percent of the time when Michael spoke with Linda, she was his therapist. But the rest, she was not only his ersatz sister-in-law but also the mother of his nephew. It was the world’s only nephilim’s mom who was regarding him now.

And her pursed lips and narrowed eyes indicated that she was not pleased.

“I thought we talked about not revealing too much, too soon to Ella.”

Michael wanted to point out that Linda had pressured him to agree to the secrecy, but that wasn’t accurate. Not at its heart. Even with his siblings’ preferences and Linda’s worry for Charlie, even if those were _not_ a factor, Michael would still hesitate to tell Ella. She was a believer, and that should make it easy. It wasn’t like Samael and Chloe Decker. Humans---even an atheist (ha) like Chloe had been---were instinctively scared of the Devil. Michael got that much. To see Sam, to really _see_ him in all his horrific, burned hideousness---the monster Sam’s own mind could make of his body---and still love him was extraordinary.

Michael could tell that much.

But he was still…Ella was a devout Catholic. She prayed regularly to, well, _him._ He tried not to listen in, really he did. Sometimes it was hard to keep his walls up. On days when his side and wing hurt more than their usual or on Thursdays when he and Sam circled ancient sleights and all the damage they’d done to each other, he couldn’t block anything. He heard her clearly then. And she revered him. But not him. Instead, Ella beseeched The Sword of God and The Great Judge he’d been once, the image that all the devout ascribed to him.

What he’d been before the Fall.

Except Michael was _nothing_ like that now. He was hobbled, and his wings were ugly and ruined. If he ever had to prove exactly what he was to her, all he’d be would serve as a letdown. And that was far from the worst part.

No, there was more.

He still saw her reaction in _Lux_ at the sting she’d set up for him during fitful bouts of sleep. Her eyes had been so wide and fearful when the taser hadn’t affected him. She’d backed away from him like a scared rabbit before a hawk, and he hated the sight of that. Yes, Ella was religious and had faith, but Michael wasn’t sure what would happen when her faith was finally rewarded. If it ever was. There was a reason that in the olden days when they were sent on earthly errands for Father that they would say “Be not afraid.”

All angels were the literal awe of God incarnate.

Would Ella fear that in him when it was no longer theoretical and, again, worse yet would she be disappointed and hate that the reality of St. Michael (and he never asked to be canonized, by the way) did not match what a mess he was now?

At the end of the day, Linda might have ulterior motives for encouraging him to stay silent on what he was. But he was scared too. Scared he’d lose her when the truth came out because at the end of the day, Ella was still a normal, mortal woman. And he was far from human. She might find it all too much when Celestials were real for her and not just “method actors.” Worse, Ella might like Sam and Amenadiel and Charlie fine, but still find _him_ lacking.

Since the Rebellion, everyone always did, even Azrael and Raphael.

He couldn’t risk it, and his idiot destruction of the carnival game had been too big a gamble to make. But Samael had done so well on basically all the boardwalk games. It had made Michael want to compete, to show off for Ella so she could reap the same kind of bounty as Chloe, and so he’d see her eyes light up with pride at him.

Michael sighed and shoved more jellybeans in his mouth. “I wasn’t thinking. I admit it was dumb, and I just…you know how Sam is. He was showboating, and I wanted to be as good. It was dumb, and I can usually be the twin with better judgment.” He felt his cheeks flush as he looked down at his good hand. “Well, except when I spend months impersonating Samael, but I’m trying now. I am, and I don’t want to be the lesser twin.”

Linda’s expression softened, and she made some marks down on her note pad. “You’re not _lesser_ , Michael. I know we have to keep working on your sense of self, but you know now that you’ve been in Los Angeles and gone through our joint sessions with Lucifer that _neither_ of you escaped from the Rebellion. Yes, your side and wings are injured. It does hamper some of what you can do.”

He nodded and wanted to explain to her what it truly meant that he could not fly well, that he could flutter fast (by human standards) if needed, that he could coast a little with great pain, but that he could never truly soar on them and hadn’t in eons. That he would never slip between planes of existence like his siblings could. He knew from the way she’d talked about it and what little Menny had told him about the two years the First Born had made his own wings rot off that Linda understood them as a mortal would. _As merely limbs_.

But wings were far more than arms or legs.

They were divinity incarnate, gifts from Father, and it was like having his soul damaged and that damage on display for all to see. It was a deformity that offended God Himself, or at least as far as his siblings treated it. They were limited in their own ways. Outside of Raphael and Azrael and his earthly living brothers, the rest of the angels saw the wreck of his wings as all Michael’s fault somehow. As if he’d wrenched his own wings from their sockets or yanked the feathers out in hunks.

But Father _still allowed it_ ; he was an eyesore because Father Willed it so.

Because the Demiurge was too dangerous, and even now, he resented Samael for dragging him down alongside of him all the way to Hell in a way.

Humans couldn’t understand that his wings, bent and broken and ugly, were as revolting a sight for their siblings as Lucifer’s scarred face was an affront to humans. It was lost in translation.

“I know,” Michael finally replied. “And I do understand that Sam’s burns are awful, that he hid them with what he thought was a glamor for billions of years. I’m trying to understand all this self-actualization that you say happened to Menny and his wings for a while, that has robbed him of his ability to stop time. I’m trying to get that it’s possible when Samael is at his most profane and infernal, that he’s doing it to himself but still can’t stop it.”

Michael shuddered to himself and was grateful this was a solo session. It would do no good to let Samael see how Michael wasn’t yet dealing well with his brother’s truly devilish form. The red leathery wings that spit in the eyes of all that angels were, the burnt skin and oozing wounds, the fucking claws…all of it was terrifying and nothing Celestial. _Worse than any Lilim_. He wouldn’t want that for himself. And he was glad that it wasn’t his curse as one half of the very busted Demiurge.

But he wouldn’t want Sam to know he felt that way either. Sam couldn’t help it any more than apparently Amenadiel could just go back to slowing time again. Just as Linda claimed Michael couldn’t yet fix his own wings.

What a fairy tale. There was no way his side…he was _not_ doing this to himself. It was as it was, and Sam had wrought it and Father maintained it.

Just…

No matter his form, Sam’s wings _worked_.

Michael wanted that desperately.

“It is. I know you’re hesitant to believe in self-actualization, but it’s very real.”

He nodded if only to keep the session going. “I agree it was weak and stupid. Sam brings that out in me, and it wasn’t even his fault. I just wanted to do more for Ella. She thinks she has to protect me a lot, as if I’m weak, and I am by angel standards. I’m the weakest Celesital now, and all the Host know it. But I’m not defenseless or pitiable, and I just wanted to win her a damn rabbit!”

“But you do understand that both you and Lucifer have suffered.”

“Yes, Linda,” he huffed.

“Lucifer has his own securities that he doesn’t share with you in session. And even then, you know he’s worried about his devil side. I think it’s hard on both of you in different ways. But you’re not in competition with each other. There’s not just space in our family or among all of us in L.A. for just one of you. You’re not his understudy or tag-along.”

“Just his more limited doppelgänger,” Michael replied tiredly.

“I don’t see that.”

“You’re nice to me. You probably shouldn’t be. Ella’s so sweet, and she likes me and no one has liked me in a long, long time, except for Raphael and Rae Rae.” And he stilled for a moment and gathered his thoughts. He knew Raphael cared for him but also saw him as a guilty black mark on his record as a healer. There was guilt bonding them too. Rae Rae…she’d been his sanctuary in the Silver City, true, but he knew she’d always loved Samael best---would always care for him best---and Michael had been the member of the Host, who for obvious reasons, had reminded her the most of Sam. “Chloe at least tolerates me now. You all should be like Trixie and Dan Espinoza, though. They have the sense to hate me.”

Linda shook her head. “Why do you feel you deserve to be hated?”

“I stole Sam’s life and played you all for fools for one. Do you need another?”

“It was wrong, but Amenadiel did far worse before he and Lucifer started to really bond as brothers here. I’m not saying it didn’t hurt, but you didn’t try and raise the dead to get around the not-killing-humans rule. You were manipulative and you gaslit, Chloe, true. But you’re trying, and that does mean something, Michael. Don’t negate your own progress.”

“I know,” he croaked out, reaching for the jellybeans again and shoving a handful so big in his mouth that he almost choked on the sugary goodness. It took a while to swallow them all before he spoke again. “I don’t. I just…I don’t deserve this.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m useless. Broken. And you all have the whole one here. Ella…she’ll always deserve better, so I wanted to…I just needed to show her for a moment I could be better too.”

Linda nodded. “It’s going to take a long time, and I understand that it’ll take a time frame longer than I’ll ever have with you.” She sighed and shook her head. “Maybe you can pop down to Hell for therapy after I die.”

Michael’s head snapped up. “What?”

He’d heard her at family dinners make comments before like that to him, like she truly believed she was damned. Michael had no idea how that could be. She was a wonderful mother, a good friend, shrewd therapist, and had done miracles with his brother. Unless the type of magic she practiced was dark curses and black magic, unless she was doing secret human sacrifices on the weekend, he had no idea why she’d be sent there.

As a judge, he’d rarely met a more worthy soul for heaven.

But the system was inherently flawed, and he could _not_ control guilt. If Linda felt she deserved Hell, then even Samael could not keep her out.

“This isn’t about me,” she said.

“You’re not going to Hell! You’re the mother of the only Nephilim. Clearly? You’re blessed!”

“I don’t think that’s exactly what I’d call it,” Linda muttered. “I mean, Charlie didn’t happen because I’m so special or worthy or good. I just lucked into him. I’m forever glad I did, but it doesn’t say anything wonderful about me.”

“Perhaps,” Michael said non-committally.

“But I meant it. We’re working for the next four decades I’d hope together, but if you and Lucifer need more, I’m sure things can be arranged between here and down below.”

Michael frowned. He’d have to talk to Sam. Whatever guilt was eating at Linda was not acceptable. This woman (and still possible witch) belonged in the Silver City. Besides, he couldn’t go between planes. His wings were too damaged to let him. Even if they’d let that fate befall Linda, and the Fist, Poison, and Sword of God _would never_ allow such a thing to come pass, Michael couldn’t continue therapy with her there.

“Let’s just try and get me to be less of a mess now, Linda. We have earth, and let’s focus on that.”

God, his poor brothers. It would eat both of them up when their mortals died. He knew that, and he wondered if they’d admitted it yet. If Linda were truly damned, then it would destroy Menny. Chloe was a miracle and had a fast pass to the Silver City where Samael could never go. It gave Michael a flash of his poor brother lingering outside the gates endlessly waiting for glimpses of her, and that soured Michael’s stomach.

Ella was…

  
They were new. It wasn’t the same for them yet. She’d probably figure out how broken a mess he was and toss him aside before it really mattered. Even then, if she didn’t, she was clearly a heavenly bound soul, and he could get Azrael to get him a lift home. But his poor, besotted brothers might be exquisitely screwed.

Wouldn’t be the first time Father was creative with punishments or played the long game.

“Exactly,” Linda agreed, interrupting his thoughts. “And on earth, you’re imminently lovable, Michael, and not someone we’re going to throw away.”

  
He laughed bitterly. “Almost all of them did, though, Linda. I can’t…I just want to do everything I can so that Ella doesn’t do it too.”

“If you really care about her, then you have to have faith in her too. Trust her judgment. If she cares about you---and clearly she does---then there is a reason for her to.”

Michael shrugged. “Maybe or maybe when she knows _all of me_ , she’ll just run anyway. At either rate, I won’t let competition with Sam get under my skin again, and I won’t be showy. You’re still right, you and Amenadiel both, and Ella doesn’t need to know what I am, okay?”

“Good. I think it’s just something that takes time, and you’ve only been dating a month or so. Maybe wait a bit before fundamentally rocking her world view.”

_And keep Charlie safe in the process of course…_

“Yes, sounds good.”

“I wanted to ask you something else.”

“Okay?”

Linda turned a page on her note pad and clicked her pen. “Do you know what you want to with your life here? You’ve been on earth a while, but you’re making Los Angeles your home. You’ve worked before, and I assume you’re going to want to work again.”

He nodded. “I have some savings, but Los Angeles is so expensive. I don’t want to live off Samael. I can’t. It’s hard enough still living in the same building with him. So, yes, I’m looking for a job. Sam set me up with his guys for a fake set of papers this time around. I have some job applications in, and maybe I’ll get interviews. I don’t know.”

Linda sat straighter and wrote notes animatedly on her pad. “More accounting work?”

“Some, but also some database maintenance and IT work too. Some in analytics. I have things just sent out. Maybe I won’t have to be a mooch off the Devil for too long.”

She nodded. “I hope that’s true since you want to be independent. But you’re _not_ a burden. You’re family, and Lucifer is happy to do it.” Linda sat her pad on the floor and stood. “That’s our time for this week. However, I want you to think about things we talked about today. On Thursday, I think it’s important you tell Lucifer that you feel like you’re still his tag-along. You’re _not_. We have enough room in our lives---at last Amenadiel, Charlie and I do---for both of you since you’re not the same angel twice.”

Michael shrugged and worked his way to his feet. Linda was polite enough to look away as he did it. Shuffling over to her, he brought her in close for a hug. “I’ll try, Linda. I…for eons in the Silver City I was _the burden_. There are no other disabled angels, and my siblings didn’t know what to make of me except to shunt me aside. Again, except for dear little Azrael and Raphael. I am grateful to them both, but I was a burden for so long, and I don’t know if I feel like less of one in L.A.” He sighed and let her go. “I don’t know if I’ll _ever_ feel like I’m not always costing those around me because of what I can’t do.”

“You don’t,” she said. “But we’ll keep at it. Good luck on your job applications. From what Chloe’s said, you really are good at attention to detail. I’m sure whoever does hire you will be lucky to have you.”

Michael laughed, despite his previously dour mood. “Sammy is a bit of a savant, I think. I don’t understand how he solves anything at the precinct but doesn’t do paperwork and drinks on the job---not that it affects us---and everything else.”

“Yeah, Chloe has mentioned it takes longer to get off work with Lucifer back as her partner.”

“Maybe she at least deals with me not because of Duma guarding Hell as a deal but because she misses the paperwork efficiency. I had a great system!”

Linda laughed again. “Yes, and I can be sure that the Devil didn’t.”

**

He was in no mood for Sam to burst into his home. Granted, “his” home was a far flung concept when it was just the apartment below Samael’s own that his brother had designed and had decorated (mostly, Michael had worked in some vetoes so it wasn’t a clone of his twin’s above). Still, he liked to try and pretend that he and his twin had boundaries.

It wasn’t like they were human twins and had started life with literally no space between them and crammed together within the Goddess’s body. And the thought of how humans reproduced, which was so like having a parasite inside for months on end was horrifying. While Michael liked children an adored his nephew, the idea of what poor Linda must have gone through was unseemly. Still, for all it mattered, you’d have thought there had never been barriers between him and Sam at all.

Sighing, Michael muted his TV (the _Bones_ marathon would have to wait) and eyed his brother.

As always, Sam was spotless and perfectly coiffed. Today’s three-piece was a shade of maroon that was highlighted by a black pocket square. It all seemed like too much. If Michael needed to be at least professional, a turtleneck and a blazer would suffice. Right now, he was in jeans and a t-shirt, which he could tell from the shake of his twin’s head that Samael didn’t approve of.

Fine, well, not every angel had to dress to the nines at all times.

“Mikey! Just the brother I wanted to see.” Samael strode in like the peacock he was and went straight to the bar to pour a Scotch. If they weren’t invulnerable, sometimes Michael would worry about him. His brother drank even on the job. Just…it was lucky Sam didn’t have to worry about cirrhosis. “I’ve a favor to ask of you.”

Michael frowned and leaned back on the sofa. It would be polite to stand and go to the bar to talk more closely with Sam, but he’d had a long day, and his right arm was aching badly. Just too much had been brought up in session, and he was dreading whatever Thursday’s session held. He didn’t…he _was_ just borrowing big swaths of Sam’s life. Nothing his brother would try and say would change that or how pathetic Michael felt.

“Did Linda put you up to this?”

Sam blinked and drained his tumbler before of course pouring himself another. “What? I haven’t talked to the good doctor since family dinner. Why? Is something wrong?”

Michael blinked back at his brother and tried to stay innocent. His brother never lied, some twisted point of honor for the Devil, even if Sam was great at both lying to himself and misleading others by omission. Dear Dad, did you have to be very careful with the things Sam _wasn’t saying_. But Michael, himself, had no compunctions about it. Apparently though, Linda hadn’t told Sam about how _useless_ Michael was feeling.

Good, then this was something else.

“No,” he said, regarding his twin. “I’m…I’m sorry I can’t stand. It’s been one of my longer days.”

He saw it then, that flicker of guilt across Samael’s face and, worse yet, pity. Michael wanted to toss his brother out just for that, even as Sammy went back to his usual, preening expression. It was such a quick flash that only Michael ever would have noticed it, since it was his face, minus a scar, emoting. It was too late for that. For being sorry. They’d ruined each other in different ways, and neither were coming back from it.

He just couldn’t deal with Samael’s pity. With anyone’s really.

“I’m…I would come back tomorrow, but this is rather pressing, and I promised the Detective that I’d get your commitment on this.”

Michael frowned and turned the television off. “Chloe? What would she want with me?”

  
Sam rolled his eyes. “Nothing prurient.”

“I was _not_ thinking that, and I wouldn’t.”

“Nor would I. However, she does have a case that’s come up and I’m flummoxed.”

Michael frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“We’ve a case where the M.O. is most unusual even for the city of angels. It’s beyond my realm of expertise.”

“Oh, is this a forensic accounting problem? I’m really good at that.”

Sam pinched the bridge of his nose and glanced toward Michael’s bedroom. His door—he’d insisted on those---was shut, but he imagined his twin was thinking about his spreadsheet sheets. “Yes, you’re quite the nerd; we’ve established that.”

“I’d love to help with that, then. Just get me all the data files and I’ll take a spin around on my computer here over the next few days.”

Samael leaned against the bar and spread his hands out expansively. “Alas, it’s not a math-based dilemma.”

Michael frowned. “Then, I’m doubly lost. You just rely on your _desire_ ability and crack through the suspects like usual. That’s effective for you. If someone can’t be desired or their needs…I do _not_ wish to Command, brother. I don’t want to. It scares them when I do and it feels too much like brainwashing.”

That was a polite term for it.

Humans had to tell Sam what they wanted. Even the strong-willed, save for Chloe Decker, eventually broke down and confessed all they wanted to him. It was disorienting enough and, if Sam ever really thought about it, a violation of that vaunted Free Will his twin loved so much for himself. However, it was not nearly as invasive as _Commanding_ humans, to make it so they were unable to do anything but what Michael willed for them.

It turned his stomach.

Sam shook his head again. “Oh, don’t be so melodramatic, Mikey. I wouldn’t…I know you don’t like that one.”

Well _now_ and after their joint sessions so far.

“Then you don’t need math, and you don’t need Command, then what do you need?” Michael prodded.

“There’s been a couple of the history department murdered at Malibu State. One was a tenured professor and one was the department secretary.”

“Well, that’s not so unusual. I assume you’ve had murders on a college campus before.”

“But then, brother,” Sam continued. “we had a case with a museum curator downtown and the same signature.”

“A serial killer?”

Samael nodded. “But the weapons are highly unusual. The Detective has determined its serial at all because the killer always leaves a scrap of the same parchment behind. Seems to be traceable to a rare edition of _The Canterbury Tales_. Miss Lopez has been working on tracking the exact book down and where our killer might have gotten it.”

“Alright?”

“But the murders are different edge weapons---a broadsword from the Scottish highlands, a rapier that seems to date back to the Renaissance, and the department secretary was killed with a type of fencing foil favored in King Louis’s court before the French Revolution.”

Michael’s eyes widened. “They’re actually antiques?”

“Real. Your Girl Friday confirmed as much. However, I’ve never been an expert on weaponry…”

Michael, despite everything, felt for a moment like they were back to training in the Silver City. Sam was gifted as a swordsman---he was _always_ gifted---but his natural talent made him a lazy study. Samael had griped after many a training session that he was not a scholar and truer words had never been spoken. As the leader of Father’s legions once, so very long ago, Michael had been an expert on every type of weapon, especially swords.

It had been his moniker after all and his duty.

“You need me to consult on the weaponry?” Michael asked.

“I do not relish the idea of the Detective and my human friends dealing with an annoyingly clever serial killer. It makes me nervous for them. The sooner we can identify the miscreant and apprehend him, the happier I’ll be, and the safer Miss Lopez and the Detective will be.”

“Espinoza?”

“I don’t give but so much of a toss about the douche, but it would upset the others and Beatrice too if he were hurt. So, since the few leads we’ve had have turned to dead ends, and the expert at the museum we’ve consulted on the blades recovered so far is adequate but nothing more for a human, well, we needed to upgrade experts. You’ve studied all the blades out there, after all.”

Michael sighed. He had kept up with them. Studying what humans used in war had been a hobby of his, something in addition to the tedium of balancing scales for Father. A way to while away the time when Rae Rae and Raphael were busy, and they often were. In his four decades consistently on earth, he’d not collected anything of his own, as that would be too big of a reminder of the sword he was no longer fit to wield. However, he had been no less keen to keep abreast on human military history.

Old habits died hard.

“Yes, and if you think I could help, of course I would. But Chloe suggested this?”

Michael was shocked that Detective Decker would. After all, the most he’d interacted with her had been on the job, pretending to be Sam in that very precinct. Michael assumed it would be a sore point for her.

Sam nodded. “She has no quarrel with you when you’re yourself, Mikey. It would help expedite everything, and it was her brilliant idea.”

“And the dullard? He hates me.”

“Daniel will deal with me should he feel compelled to run his asinine gob again.” Michael grinned a little, despite his earlier mood, when his brother’s eyes flared red for just a minute. Only three months ago if even Father had said that the Devil would be protective over him, Michael would have thought Dad had gone crazy. “Have we an arrangement?”

Michael’s grin widened. “You know I’d help Ella no matter what. However, you did say it was a deal, right?”

“A deal could be arranged if you required something else. Whatever would you need?”

“Oh, Sammy, I’ll take your case with you. Just in return I get an open-ended I.O.U.”

Samael narrowed his eyes. “I rarely give those. I can count on one hand the number I’ve given since the Garden.”

Michael shrugged. In reality, he had no leverage. He wanted Ella tracking a serial killer far less than even Sam did for his detective. Michael would have done it regardless, and they both understood that. Then again, he knew his brother very well, even now. And Samael could never refuse on the grounds of his pride.

“Surely, you’re not afraid, Sammy. An open-ended deal for your dear twin wouldn’t hurt.”

Sam rolled his eyes this time. “I fear nothing.”

“Then we do have a deal, right?”

“Sure, there’s nothing you can ask for that I’d loathe, I’m sure of that.”

“Perhaps,” Michael said, smirking back at his twin. “But whatever your precinct needs, I’ll try. I don’t know why you think I’m better than a human expert.”

“Because you were there from when humans forged steel and because you’ve spent millennia studying it. All of that eclipses a few, paltry human decades of so-called authority.”

“Good then,” Michael replied, struggling to his feet, and he ignored the way his brother studied him as he limped to the bar. He fumbled a little as he poured himself a soda. “I’d do anything to keep her safe, you know.”

Sam nodded. “I know, Michael, and now you understand how I’ve felt for so very long about the Detective.”

He raised his glass high and clinked it against his twin’s. “I’ll drink to that.”

  
And to the I.O.U. he’d already earned.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael meets Ella for lunch and she finds out who their newest case consultant is going to be.

**Chapter Three**

There was a knot of tension deep in Ella’s gut as she went through the blood pattern analysis again from the double crime scene at Malibu State. Even with the expert they were consulting with on antique weapons, Ella just felt out of her league. Besides, the last serial killer they’d dealt with---that crazy poisoning experiments guy---had almost gotten Chloe killed. It seemed like the craziest miracle of all that Lucifer had been able to find the antidote formula by rifling through the professor’s apartment and leaving no stone unturned. The idea of some dude who was so into ancient weapons that the next crime scene might come up with a scimitar or a mace or who knew what was intense.

It was just the sooner the case was closed, the better. Serial killers just felt like a whole different breed and smarter than usual.

But if she were being honest with herself, something else was bothering her. It shouldn’t. She’d promised herself _not_ to let it. But since her date at the Santa Monica pier with Michael, well, Ella’s brain hadn’t been able to stop. That night after Michael had left her apartment, she’d tried to get sleep. Really she had. But her brain had been going a million miles an hour and all she could think about was how _hard_ he’d hit the machine and the rocketing of the bullet part of it into the Pacific Ocean. Deep down, Ella knew that wasn’t normal. Just like with Lucifer everyone at the precinct knew that something was off about him besides his eccentricities and the “character” he was playing. She’d definitely heard a couple different unis after separate cases had been closed whispering about arriving on the scene to find Lucifer had damaged stuff that couldn’t have been done single handedly. Sometimes actual metal shipping crates dinted or, more usually, suspects screaming about the Devil. There were still a couple who never really recovered and were in mental hospitals now. And her mind was still being plagued by what it all could mean.

She just…it was stupid.

They hadn’t even been officially dating, and she’d shoved a feather in his face---a weird ass feather sure---and demanded to know if he was an angel.

_Locuras_.

She finally had something good for herself with the sweetest guy, and she was trying to find an out, a reason it didn’t make sense. Considering her history with Rae Rae, it wasn’t surprising that her crazy brain had latched onto worrying that Michael might be _that Michael_ and that maybe, just maybe, Lucifer wasn’t actually a method actor.

But the Devil didn’t solve crimes in Los Angeles and run a nightclub. And St. Michael was the head of the heavenly host and the strongest warrior in heaven. As stalwart and strong as her Michael was, well, the Sword of God didn’t really describe him.

She was just getting nervous, trying to pull that ripcord before _she_ fucked up the relationship or Michael saw she wasn’t that stable. This wouldn’t be the first relationship Ella ruined by either bailing out early on or being a little paranoid about. Although, in the past, it had been worries she’d been stepped out on or cheating. This was the first time with a guy where she’d started questioning if he was even human.

It all made no sense.

Yes, she was a devout Catholic again. Yes, she believed in the Big Guy being out there and watching over them all. But there was a difference between loving the Big Guy and her church community and the possibility that she was friends with Satan, dating St. Michael, and, well, that Amenadiel and Charlie had to be angelic or partially too. That wasn’t real. That was the kind of thing that if she mentioned it to _anyone_ , even as nice as Chloe was to her about the ghost thing…well.

She’d end up on forced leave and Michael would never talk to her again.

And yet, even as her mind had circled that all Saturday night and even into Sunday morning when she’d fed Margaret and done some training tricks with her too, Ella couldn’t shake the things that she wasn’t able to force away and _stop_ noticing. Michael’s surprising strength had just shaken everything loose again.

Maybe she had met him at _Lux_ and tased him with no effect on him at all. Maybe that hadn’t been her just passed out in the lab with a fever dream instead. Maybe that gray feather which had been the only trace of him at Chloe’s that night after she’d just turned around for seconds…the one that had brought her such an odd sense of comfort…maybe it had been real and _his_. And maybe he could pull off the inhuman feat of breaking a machine like the strength tester on the boardwalk because he wasn’t human.

And then, once her mind made that full circuit, whether at home or right now in the lab, Ella would hear her mamí’s voice in her head. All those admonishments, all those tips on how to just settle down and attract the right type of boy would bubble over.

_Boys don’t like smart girls, mija. Don’t over think with them. And they won’t date locas, so hide it. Bury it deep, and never ever talk about it._

So, she had to be wrong.

Michael and Lucifer were weird. That was a fact, but it was because they’d clearly grown up and escaped a cult run by their asshole father. They were both dealing with decades of trauma and one of them had sheltered himself from the world and from a lot of interaction with people at all and the other had decided to lean hard into rebelling with every sin he could get his hands on.

That was it.

It _had_ to be.

And yet…Ella stepped away from her microscope and the analysis that just wasn’t getting a thorough reworking like it should be. She was trying to go back over her original conclusions, see if she missed anything that might help their weapons expert. But all she could think about was Michael and herself, mostly fearing that she was getting paranoid about everything. She slipped over to her desk and her eyes fell on the collected statues and candles there.

The blessed virgin always kept a lookout on her station. The cross, of course, around her neck, because the Big Guy was with her and after her problems with faith, Ella was never going to lose that relationship again. And the statue of St. Michael, who she had reached out to so often as a child, who had comforted her during long, terrifying nights in the hospital. Had been a rock of sorts for a kid who had no idea how to deal with so much pain.

_St. Michael, I’m just crazy, right? Help me. I know I’m overthinking this, that this is what I do…nothing’s weird out there, well, accept me._

Ella sighed and ran one finger over the cool stone of the figure’s sword. “ _Rayos_ , I’m really being an idiot, right?”

Looking over her shoulder, making sure she’d left her blinds down, Ella grabbed the key she kept hidden under her mouse pad and opened the bottom drawer of her desk. There was only one thing in it---the evidence bag with at least six, blood-encrusted white feather that one ornithologist had already told her couldn’t be from any bird she’d ever studied. With feathers that under a microscope had barbules that adhered together and, Ella swore, almost formed blades. Feathers that had littered the shootout where Pierce had died by the dozens.

And where had they even come from?

Nothing in that antiques storage space had even had a single feather in it. Even now, the case had just been closed quickly because everything with the LAPD being tricked into hiring the Sinnerman, who had then killed a D.A. in cold blood was such an embarrassment that the city just wanted it done with.

The only reason Ella had the half-dozen she did was because a friend in evidence had owed her a favor and smuggled these out.

Sighing, she opened the bag and carefully—the freaking things could be so sharp---pulled out a single feather. It was crusted with dried, brown by now blood, but the oddest thing about it was the way she swore it shone just a bit. That was totally bonkers, but there was something about even the damaged, spotted feather that seemed ethereal somehow, even more than a year after it had been relegated to an evidence locker.

Being as cautious as she could be, Ella ran her index finger over the most pristine part of the feather. Something soft and warm flared up in her chest. It was not the same sense of peace and clarity that she swore had come from the brittle grey feather she’d found outside of Chloe’s. But there was still _something_ there. A sense of awe, maybe.

And she’d handled a lot of feathers lately. She never got anything at all emotionally from Margaret’s moltings.

This felt so different, and like it was easing into her mind and soul.

And, of course, had to be just more insane thoughts. She’d never had a real ghost friend. Rae Rae had to be some manifestation of her subconscious or a hallucination, no matter how sweet she’d seemed a month or so ago for their Buffy-fest. Rae Rae wasn’t real. The Devil and archangels existed but she couldn’t possibly be friends with them, and these were _just_ feathers.

Nothing more.

If Ella wanted to keep her life going as well as it was, she had to accept that. She did. Still, some part of her couldn’t let it go. She was always working to put pieces together on a case, to make the parts that didn’t quite go together take form to reveal the true picture. This was similar. For a while, she’d been so embarrassed by yelling at Michael on the penthouse balcony, by accusing him of the impossible, that she’d forced her questions away.

Until last weekend, and all the jigsaw puzzles pieces were obvious to her again.

These feathers were the _biggest_ part of that. She had to find another ornithologist, someone who could help her figure out what these were if they weren’t from birds. It wasn’t going to do her any good to keep them in this desk anymore. Ella bit her lower lip, hesitating between her need _to know_ and that part of her conscience that her mother had shaped. If she didn’t ask questions about Michael’s weirdness (and yeah, Lucifer’s too), then everything could be as sweet and perfect as it was right now. But it was getting harder to convince herself to ignore things too. She was a scientist, damn it, and Ella wanted the truth.

Even if it was crazy.

Even if it was impossible.

_And even, mija, if he leaves you?_

She closed her eyes even as she fumbled for her laptop case and shoved the evidence bag inside a zip pocket. No, something was going on. She’d told herself a few times this was all craziness in her own head. But something was going on here, and she’d always been drawn to finding the truth. These feathers were a key part of it. Ella _knew_ it. So, she’d just keep digging.

She’d settled everything away, including her laptop bag under her desk, when a knock sounded on her door. Despite how jittery and distracted she’d been with her own existential crisis, Ella couldn’t help but smile.

Only one person ever bothered to knock on her door around the precinct.

Readjusting her ponytail, Ella headed to her stool at her lab table. She’d worry about feathers and inhuman feats of strength and all her possible _locuras_ later. For now, she had a lunch guest.

Michael knocked a second time because of course he did and was as polite and hesitant as his twin was bold and, okay, sometimes rude. Ella smiled broadly---despite everything---and called out, “Hey, _corazón_ , you can come in. No one else even bothers to knock.”

Her boyfriend opened the door and grinned shyly back at her. “I know, but if you’re in the middle of an experiment or a key part of like collecting a fingerprint, I didn’t want to interrupt. Your job’s important.”

“So is me not starving,” she said, winking at him.

He nodded and set the bag of take out from a local Vietnamese place she’d introduced him to a few weeks ago on the table. “I figured that. Can’t science on an empty stomach, right?”

Ella grinned wider and dug into the first banh mi she’d grabbed. The crisp carrots and pork belly were delicious, and her stomach rumbled a little as she gobbled it down. Looking up at the clock, Ella blushed. When had it gotten to be three?

“Sorry,” Michael added, pulling out a sandwich for himself. “I do the best I can, but today traffic was crazy and my Uber driver wasn’t the best. You’re clearly starving already.”

“It’s fine. I was pouring over this tough case we have and trying to see if I missed anything. Time ran away from me.”

Michael considered that and bit into his food. “Yeah, I did try and text, but you must have been really busy. I didn’t get an answer.”

Ella’s cheeks grew more heated, and part of her wondered what would have happened if Michael had arrived ten minutes earlier. Granted, he _always_ knocked because he was a total gentleman, but if he’d been here earlier, he’d have found her fretting over feathers.

_Smooth, Lopez, so smooth_.

She would have rather he’d almost caught her masturbating than walk in on her looking at feathers that couldn’t possibly be like angel feathers but she couldn’t let it drop. It made her a good forensic tech, but it just made other parts of her life harder.

“Uh yeah,” she added. “Like I said, this case has been intense and I just…thanks for the food anyway? How are you doing? Heard back from any of the job applications?”

Michael frowned. “No, and that’s probably understandable. Linda told me it can take a while to get jobs.”

“Dude, in this economy? Totally.”

“Yeah, and I do fill out what I can so I feel I’m staying busy. My brothers are so slammed. I mean, Amenadiel is embracing full time, stay-at-home Dad duties, and Charlie’s a ball of energy. My nephew really gets into everything!”

The smile bloomed across Michael’s face, and she loved to see it there.

“You really love the nephew, huh?”

“He’s great. I mean Sam’s…I know he likes Charlie but in kind of a theoretical way? I think kids make him nervous, except for Trixie. They seem to have an understanding going, but we both like him. I’m amazed that he exists and---” Michael stopped then and sobered a little. “Let me put it this way. I didn’t see Menny settling down like this. He’s the oldest and we have such a, um, big family. Dad always expected him to set an example for all of us. Honestly, him just diving into Dad stuff like this is a bigger rebellion that Sam starting _Lux_.”

“Your dad didn’t want you all to be happy and settle down?” Ella asked. She offered a wry snort and grabbed a bag of potato chips from Michael’s delivery bounty. “That’s all my abuelita and my mamí talk about. They’re desperate for grandkids and my idiot brothers aren’t good at keeping girlfriends so forget marriage and stuff.” She frowned and considered her words. “I mean, not that Linda and Amenadiel have to get married. They seem really happy and they love Charlie. I just mean around the Lopez household? Oh yeah, you’d have to put a ring on it.”

Michael blinked and his mouth hung open.

Crap, she had a way of doing that to people. Surely, he didn’t think she was trying to press for way too honking much after a month, did he?

She set her bag of chips down and held up both hands. “Not a back-handed way to get you to propose, Mike, don’t worry.”

He gulped a little but spoke eventually. “No, I didn’t…of course not. Father always has his plans. Except for the three of us, I’m sure my siblings are still happy to fulfill them. Us having our own lives or families never factored into it. So, yeah, Amenadiel starting a family, even if I gather that Charlie was kind of a surprise, well, it’s a huge rebellion.”

“You shouldn’t have to do just what your dad wants.”

“Well, we don’t. Now,” Michael conceded. “I think I spent way too long trying to please Father, and then when I was hurt…” he sighed and looked down at his right hand that, like most days, hung limply at his side. “I was someone to be proud of when I could serve his needs. When I couldn’t…he stopped turning to me at all, mostly pretended I wasn’t home anymore. My brothers and sisters, except for Azrael and Raphael, took that cue too. But I still spent way too long hoping that Dad would see me again. I don’t know…it’s weird now that I’m trying to have my own life. I like this,” he emphasized his point but reaching out and taking her hand in his left one. “I should have left to Los Angeles a long time ago.”

“Definitely. We have great Mexican food and the best beaches.”

“You have the best forensic scientist I know.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re too smooth.”

“Sam says I’m not,” Michael replied, his tone irritated but no more than she ever was with Ricardo. “Anyway, Amenadiel is busy with Charlie. Samael has two jobs, even if I don’t understand how he’s so good at being a consultant when he is terrible at paperwork!”

“It’s a mystery. I think Chloe still misses having a partner with a filing system that works!”

Michael frowned. “Wait, Sam has one at all?”

Ella rolled her eyes. “Kind of? I dunno. The one time he tried it, Lucifer tried explaining it to me but he mostly broke it down into things like ‘obvious killer,’ ‘sexy suspects,’ and ‘boring crimes.’”

Michael laughed. “Oh, I see, that’s a joke. You had me going for a minute.”

“No, that’s true. That’s the system Lucifer tried. Chloe didn’t like it at all.”

“My brother may actually be a savant.”

Ella chuckled. “He’s great! It’s just he’s more of a on-the-job, instinctual crime solver. Kind of the whole way that desire thing works, you know? The rest of us do the paperwork and make sure it’s all by the book.”

“Quite,” Michael replied. “Anyway, my brothers have lives and carry their own weight in them. I’m still just bumming around an apartment below Sammy’s and currently on his dime, even if I have some savings. It’s just Los Angeles---”

“Costs an arm and a leg? Yeah, no shit, dude.” Ella replied. “But you don’t have to reform everything right away. It’s only been a couple months since you and Amenadiel and Lucifer did that whole kumbaya thing and you started going to therapy, you know?”

Michael considered that and ate his own sandwich for a long, contemplative time before he spoke. “But I hate being a burden. Sam shouldn’t have to support me.”

Ella squeezed his hand again. “I know, but he’s happy to do it. Dude wastes money like all the time, let him actually invest it well. You’ll find a job. It just might take longer than you think. Besides, once you do, we can’t do lunch! This is fun right?”

Michael’s brilliant smile was back on his face, and she was never going to get used to it. She’d been a deeply invested Deckerstar fan, and it thrilled her that since Lucifer’s still not really explained trip, that her best friends were really together. She’d always noticed, even from her early days at this precinct, that Lucifer lit up when he looked at Chloe, like she was a goddess or something. It was adorably cute.

She never expected to see a similar look leveled at her.

It warmed her all over.

“I will miss this, definitely. Look, Ella, about me being around the precinct and more than just at lunch---”

That was as far as Michael got before Lucifer and Chloe barged into the lab. Her friend looked at Michael, decked out in his usual tan turtle neck and brown suit coat (and she was pretty sure he just had like six sets of the same thing even if he had different t-shirt styles), and sighed.

“Brother, you could do better with your sartorial choices. I could help!”

Three flat nos rang out in the lab at once.

Michael stood as straight as he could and narrowed his eyes at his twin. “I’m fine. This is professional and practical.”

“And painfully dull.”

Ella glanced at Chloe who rolled her eyes. Lucifer was a great friend and a better brother than any of her actual ones, but dude was a project. She wondered how much of her life Chloe spent just explaining to Lucifer he couldn’t just say the shit he did. Not that it affected him or that Luce changed his behavior.

Still, it was rude.

Ella sidled up next to Michael and wrapped her arm around his right one. “Michael’s fine. You’re the one in the jade and silver thing and it can be a lot!”

Lucifer held his chin up haughtily. “It’s avant garde.”

“It’s overkill,” Michael grumbled. “Anyway, Sam, I didn’t bring extras. I’m sorry if you and Chloe want sandwiches, but we’re fresh out.”

Chloe shook her head. “No, and I know usually Ella gets an hour for lunch, but the lieutenant wants to start the---ugh, stupid press for this one---but the _Santa Monica Sword Slayer_ briefing early today. She and Dan are already in the conference room, so we need you guys now.”

“Sure, I was just going over the blood splatter from Malibu State again and---” Ella blinked between her friends and her boyfriend. It finally dawned on her that Chloe had included Michael in her statement. “Wait, what?”

Lucifer rolled his eyes and straightened his cufflinks. “Mikey, you should keep our dear Miss Lopez apprised of all the big things in a relationship.”

Chloe snorted. “Right, Lucifer. No offense, babe, but do not offer Michael dating advice. I don’t think it usually helps.” She frowned back at Mike. “That said, I thought Ella would know by now.”

“Know what?” she asked.

“I’m sorry,” Michael interrupted. “I was going to tell you at lunch, but we were going to start sooner and, uh, not get off on Charlie tangents.”

Lucifer snorted. “There’s not much that rapscallion can do currently but toddle about and drool on himself. How long could such a conversation have taken?”

“Lucifer, come on,” Chloe said, her tone clipped. “Ella, no big deal. We needed a better outside consultant than the museum contact on the weapons side of this. Michael fit the credentials and was nice enough to agree. He’ll be working here for this case till we’re done. That’s okay, right?”

Ella blinked between all three of them, and mostly she was excited. It was nice enough to have Michael visit a few times a week for lunch. It might be fun to work with him on a case, especially when this time she could do it without guilt unlike the first couple months he’d been around. After all, she’d be working with _Michael_ this time and not just a fake-Lucifer. No guilt problems this time around. On the other hand, she felt hurt that Michael hadn’t told her sooner. They’d been on the phone with each other until midnight last night. He had to have known by then since the lieutenant was pretty meticulous of planning out her week’s meetings in advance where she could.

He just hadn’t mentioned it.

Ouch.

“No, I…that’s great. So the conference room on three?”

Chloe nodded. “Yup, hurry on up guys. We’ll see you there.”

Chloe and Lucifer left then, okay, well after Lucifer stole the unfinished half of Michael’s sandwich, which Ella knew was a total brother annoyance move. Cesar was had been such a douche about that when they were kids.

Michael packed up their trash and shoved it in the trash can behind her. “Hey, are you mad?”

Ella shook her head. “No, not really.”

“Oh.”

“Oh what?”

“I think I get this. That’s definitely not a real ‘no.’ I’ve seen Sam and Chloe fight a few times now. I think you’re mad.”

Ella snorted. “First, Chloe and I get mad in very different ways. Trust me, when I’m really pissed at you, you’ll know. Mostly because I’ll hit you with my shoe, like _a lot_. Second, I’m just more hurt. You have to have known about this for a while, dude.”

Michael nodded. “Sam asked me on Sunday so a few days, yes. I just…I meant to tell you but then we’d talk about stuff that wasn’t just shop or being around the precinct or this possible consulting gig, and it just kind of fell to the side.”

Ella quirked her head at him. “Maybe.”

“Huh?”

“Sometimes you don’t want to tell me things. Again, so not a big deal if we have an extra consultant on the case. I know you’re brilliant, and you’d be a great help. You were before when you were um---”

“Being Sam?” Michael said, looking down at his shoes. “I know.”

“And Chloe’s cool with this?”

“It was her idea. She knew we needed my area of expertise. I was worried about it when Sam even offered because I didn’t want her to feel bad. We’re kind of friends now, sort of, but I know I used her really badly when I first came to L.A. I didn’t know if we could…if it would hurt her to have me here considering all the loaded memories.”

Ella considered that even as her fingers drummed on the table. “I’m just…I wish you’d felt you could tell me sooner, that’s all. I hate feeling out of the loop, you know?”

Michael nodded and offered her his left hand. “Well, I’m the new and better weapons expert on the case, and I’d love an escort to the third floor. Maybe the elevator is treacherous territory.”

“You’re such a dork.”

“Yes, but you like it.”

She nodded and wrapped her arms around his left one as they left the lab. “But no, this is pretty cool. I just…Mike, don’t tell me things last. I get this was short notice, but you don’t have to be nervous around me. You can just be honest, I promise. It won’t make me mad.” She looked up at him, at his deep brown eyes that seemed bottomless and even at the scar that ran over his cheek (and she wasn’t quite sure what kind of make up or trick he’d pulled to hide it as long as he had when being his brother). “You can tell me anything, you know that, right?”

“Sure,” he said, although something sad seemed to flicker across his expression. “That’s what I like about you.”

She nodded again as they made their way to the elevator. “Wait, rewind. Since when are you a medieval weapons expert?”

“Well, see, I said I was in the military and…”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael and Dan fight at the team briefing on the serial killer case.

**Chapter Four**

Michael felt uncomfortable the minute he walked arm and arm with Ella into the conference room. Theoretically, he shouldn’t have been. The team with the highest solve rate in the precinct has vouched for him. Even if Samael is unorthodox and undisciplined in his work---though beloved by the station all the same—Detective Decker’s skill as an investigator was sterling. She came up with the idea, and Lieutenant Meyers had seized on it. But he felt again as if he were an impostor. It was odd. He was less of one now than the months he’d spent pretending to be Sam, and he did know an inhuman amount about weapons from all eras and all over the world.

He was qualified for this.

But the stares of the few, confused officers also in the session, who mostly volleyed their gaze between him and Samael, usually lingering longer over him with his hitched shoulder and scarred face, were hard to shake.

The death glare the dullard was aiming his way was far worse.

If anything, Ella took his arm tighter in her own as she led him to his seat. “Sorry, we didn’t mean to keep people waiting,” she replied, offering a brilliant smile to everyone, and sandwiching herself seat wise between Michael, himself, and Sam.

Lt. Meyers nodded and started into the basics of the case, everything that Michael had been over both with Sam and Chloe already and by going over the case files himself. But he nodded and took notes as she talked anyway, trying to see what thoughts the lieutenant has as well, what she’d brought to the case from her perspective. So far, they had a basic profile that wasn’t anything shocking---middle-aged white male, intelligent, probably a historian or a weapons dealer. Nothing that Michal hadn’t figured or discussed with Chloe already.

As the basic case brief ended, Meyers turned to him, her green eyes shrewd and bright, and gestured with her right hand. “This is Michael Demiurgos. He’s the brother of Decker’s consultant.”

Michael forced himself not to grin at the way the lieutenant was clearly avoiding mentioning his brother’s moniker. After years with the LAPD, it still seemed that most of the force was determined as ever to see Lucifer has an eccentric, one who solved crimes somehow and as long as the cases cleared don’t ask too many questions. Then again, a police lieutenant wasn’t keen to mention Lucifer Morningstar by name.

After all, the Devil wasn’t really working with the LAPD. _Of course not_.

“And,” the lieutenant continued. “He happens to be a weapons expert with a greater depth of experience than Dr. Smythe out of UCLA. He’s going to be the replacement expert on this case. He’ll be going to the crime scenes with Decker and Morningstar, and I am sure he’ll bring a depth of knowledge to our hunt. Any questions?”

It didn’t take long before the dullard raised his hand. “Are you serious, Lieutenant?”

Michael stilled and underneath the table, Ella took his weaker hand in her own, trying to reassure him. This was what he’d been dreading even more than trying to find equilibrium as himself on a case with Chloe. It was, of course, that Espinoza was going to loathe his very presence on the team.

As if Michael were at fault for the endless feud between a dullard beneath his concern and his brother. Samael had made his own bed long ago with Espinoza. Granted, Espinoza still blamed Samael for Charlotte’s death even when it was obvious even to Michael as an utter outsider that the blame belonged squarely on Cain’s shoulders. Sam had tried his best, and he knew for a fact that Charlotte had been escorted to heaven by Amenadiel. Hell, he’d had the odd task of processing the only soul he knew of in all his tenure as Judge who had been weighed for Hell and _gone there_ yet truly earned a reprieve.

And not for saving the First Born of heaven but for giving her life for a dear friend.

That had turned the scales more than anything else, the utter selflessness of her actions and care for Amenadiel as a person, not as some grand gesture to impress Dad. It was nothing Espinoza could possibly understand, and everything worthy. Charlotte Richards was an impossible miracle in her own way---not the same as Chloe, of course---but a bar that any other soul could and should aspire to.

Now, she was living in paradise.

But the dullard didn’t understand that, couldn’t truly, and so it was all about digging at Sam, and, by extension, at him too.

Michael swallowed even as Espinoza dug into his rant. This was far from the first time he’d been blamed for his brother’s actions and tarred by the same brush. Most of the Host had always avoided him, both for his damaged side---as if his flaws were contagious---and because he _looked_ so very much like Samael, was a reminder of the rebel he’d worked so hard against.

Everyone saw Sam first.

He tensed and Ella squeezed his hand again. Alright, _almost everyone_ , and he knew he was infinitely lucky to have such a wonderful, supportive girlfriend at his side.

“…and he and Lucifer do the whole _Parent Trap_ thing at work!” Espinoza concluded. “You can’t possibly want to have someone who’s played consultant for fun and as some weird secret twin prank doing it for real. Have you even checked his credentials?”

Samael smiled at the lieutenant and Michael could feel it, the oozing out of Sam’s powers over desire. They could always sense when the other was using their powers, two sides of the same coin---desire and control---even though they could not affect the other. “Now, now, Sylvia, that’s not untrue, but a few indiscretions amongst squabbling siblings can be forgiven, can’t they?”

The lieutenant’s eyes glazed over a bit, and Michael watched as his twin played the woman’s desires like a fiddle. “I think so. What I want is results. We have four bodies---one just dropped today---and the press is on our heels. We have that idiot nickname, and it’ll be _years_ before the LAPD lives down something as stupid as _The Santa Monica Sword Slayer_.” The sharp intensity came back into her gaze and she leveled it cuttingly at the dullard. “If this case isn’t resolved quickly, it’s _my ass_ , and I promise you, this whole unit will be out on the street with me. So, Espinoza, do what you have to do and suck it up. I’ve seen Demiurgos’s credentials, and he stays.”

Credentials were a bit generous of a term, and even Michael could admit that. However, his brother’s contacts had provided him with a sterling paper trail. And, to help facilitate Chloe’s plan, he’d been asked to submit a written analysis of his own on the weaponry based on the crime scene photos. He’d caught things that the professor hadn’t because he’d _known_. He’d seen human wars, watched a claymore in action or see a rapier deep in the back of mortals, unfortunately, on errands he’d been dispatched to earth to deal with.

Dr. Smythe was all theory and research, and Michael was practice and in the flesh.

Nothing could top that. So, no, he had not degree from a human school, but he had seen every weapon the human race had come up with, from the rock Cain used to slay his brother to the ferocity of the bombs and jets humans used now. It pained him, deep down, that humans were so gifted at coming up with ways to harm each other. That Father had gifted them with Free Will (a permanent sore point with his twin even now), and they had squandered it to tear each other apart.

Then again, thinking of the ruins of heaven for ages after the Rebellion, perhaps humans and Celestials were only so different.

Espinoza fumed at the lieutenant’s order. “This is a terrible idea. You can’t trust Lucifer and you definitely can’t trust Michael.”

His head snapped back a bit, and even Ella’s hand clutching his wasn’t calming him. Because Espinoza wasn’t completely wrong. The dullard had hit a truth that pained Michael even now. He had been loathsome and untrustworthy. He had acted in a way truly beneath the Host. He’d manipulated Chloe Decker’s feelings and gaslit her and her daughter for months. If both still hated him, Michael could not fault them for that.

He’d twisted Ella in knots.

“Dan, chill out. Trust me, dude. You want to _cierra la boca ahora_ , or you’ll get my shoe,” Ella snapped.

The dullard crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Ella. “So, Michael, you’re going to let Ella fight all your battles for you.”

“Dan, seriously, this is between you and Lucifer and about Charlotte and you need to get over it!” Ella shouted back.

“You know it’s true though. Lucifer’s weird, and Michael and he are playing us all for idiots. I don’t know how having what? Two con men around is going to help our case.”

Ella flinched. Michael felt it, the way her hand went slack, and his mind focused back on the game of strength at the pier. The truth laced through the dullard’s words was still there. There were things---massive, earth shattering things about himself---that Michael was hiding from her. He wasn’t honest with her, but it was for a good reason. It was.

_Because you’re wrong, and she’ll know what a disgrace you are some day and your wing…_

Michael stilled and eyed Espinoza. This was enough. He’d been the Sword of God, banished his idiot twin from heaven---even if they were working on that huge canyon in their own relationship---and fought the Endless and so many terrifying pantheon monsters. He was not to be cowed by one of the most petty, sniping humans he’d ever met.

“I am, without a doubt, Daniel, the most well studied expert on weapons you will ever meet.”

“Right, and we’re all just gonna be snowed by you!”

“Douche, do try and not always live up to your name,” Sam added. “Defy expectations once in a great while. Shall we?”

Chloe sighed and looked at the lieutenant who was seething in her chair. “Dan, this was my request. You want to complain to someone, you take it up with me after this meeting and the crime scene work.”

“Yes, Detective Espinoza,” Meyers replied. “With your own spotty record and multiple ethics investigations, you’re hardly one to talk about questionable characters.”

“He’s a fraud!” Daniel snapped.

Michael narrowed his eyes at Espinoza. “I’m many things, but I served long in my post, and I have educated myself thoroughly on weapons you’ve _never even heard of_. You want my opinion? For one Smythe got the age of the foil used in one of the murders wrong by at least thirty years. He didn’t know the design of it had obvious hallmarks and flourishes tired directly to King Louis the 16th and his court. He ascribed it to a post Revolution Era France, which matters because this weapon was infinitely rarer and harder to find after the Reign of Terror ended. Whoever is doing this, they’re one of the best weapons collectors on Earth, and they have impressive resources. So, yes, do test me more.”

There was silence in the room after that.

Michael thought that the dullard would finally let it drop so that they could get to the crime scene and get on with their day. But even he’d underestimated how desperately Espinoza wanted to sink himself and shoot off his mouth.

“You were still hanging around my kind under a smoke screen. You think I like that you were lying to Trixie and to Chloe for whatever bullshit revenge and stupid brother prank you were pulling? Because I don’t!”

“Detective Espinoza---” Meyers started.

Michael had had it. It all poked too close to his own feelings, and he would not work this case and have Espinoza lay into him ever day. The dullard had _zero_ idea of who he was dealing with. It had been a very long time since he’d Controlled a human. His powers worked on younger siblings only, and he had no need to try them in eons, relegated to the back rooms as it were of the Silver City. But he felt it, the power thrumming through him and the utter strength of his _conviction_.

“Be quiet, Daniel Espinoza. You’ll speak when I allow it!” Michael bellowed.

Beside him Ella shot him a frustrated look, one he’d seen Chloe give him and Sam both when they argued at the penthouse and couldn’t keep brotherly squabbles contained. Clearly, she’d had it with her friends and her boyfriend striking at each other.

The lieutenant shook her head. “Espinoza, Demiurgos is here until I say he’s not. You get your shit together and you let our expert work. If you derail it over bullshit grudges, I’ll have your badge.” She eyed him too in turn. “Demiurgos, I’m taking a leap going with you over Smythe now. Do _not_ make me regret it.”

“Understood,” Michael said, his tone contrite.

The dullard was a deep shade of unflattering mauve, but he turned to the lieutenant and nodded. Then tried to speak. Espinoza opened his mouth and moved his jaws…did all the things he was supposed to, but nothing came out, just the sigh of air from his lungs.

Daniel’s eyes widened and he grabbed his throat. Then tried again

_Nothing._

He started to cough and Ella and Chloe had switched from being frustrated friends to concerned ones and rushed toward Dan with water to help him in what had no escalated into a coughing fit.

The lieutenant stood and rolled her eyes. “Espinoza, knock the games off. You all have to get this closed. If a fifth body drops, you won’t like the next meeting we have. Now, get your shit together and get to USC. Their on campus art museum…one of their curator’s was murdered this morning. Get to it!”

Michael stood soon after the lieutenant was gone and hurried to Ella’s lab, leaving that dullard to gape like a fish and deal with his problems. He could Command Espinoza’s voice to come back at any time Michael saw fit, but he was _tired_ and angry, and the bastard had insulted him twice, called him on the carpet before the precinct. It was time he learned exactly what he was dealing with.

For now, the dullard was in no pain at all. It wasn’t a sore throat or a strangulation. It was, in effect, nothing more than the most rapid onset case of laryngitis on record. Let the dullard cool off for a few hours, let him blessedly stay silent. It was what he’d _earned_.

Michael had barely sat down on one of the stools in Ella’s workspace when Samael darted in. He stalked in with most of his usual insouciance, but Michael knew the difference, could see the tight set of his brother’s shoulders even as Sam tried for his usual, relaxed prowl.

The tension was highlighted by Samael shutting Ella’s door behind him and locking it tightly.

“Tell me, Mikey, that you’re rusty with your powers, and what’s unfurling three floors above us is nothing more than an accident.”

He drummed his fingers on the cool metal of the lab table and sighed. “Do you really think I could lose power over _Command_ any more than you ever could over _Desire_?”

Sam shrugged and leaned against Ella’s desk. Michael knew the moment when his twin spied and really recognized the statute of St. Michael on Ella’s windowsill. That small roll of Sam’s eyes was quite the giveaway. “There’s a story about that, and I’ll tell you later.”

Michael paused and connected that nugget of information to the utter power he’d felt the one time he’d seen his twin’s _other_ form, the barely contained power of the full Devil in all his, yes, terrifying glory. “It’s stronger when you’re not yourself.”

Lucifer laughed bitterly. “Again, you’ll understand how self-actualization works eventually, when you believe me and Amenadiel.”

“It can’t be true,” Michael countered.

Because if it were…if there were a chance that he had done this to himself, had kept his right side weak and his left wing a broken mess for eons, then Michael couldn’t forgive himself for it. For his own perfect self-torture.

“When I’m charred and reddened and have those unspeakable bat-wings, I am _still_ myself. It’s just a facet, one which even now with Linda’s work, I cannot control entirely. But I am both mostly the archangel I was and the Devil.”

Michael sighed. “Well I’m just all broken, so perhaps you’ve got one on me there, Sammy.”

“And when I get that way, my ability over _Desire_ runs rampant. It can be overwhelming. You haven’t been on earth but so long, and the douche is the first mortal you’ve interacted with who has also managed to set your teeth on edge. No criticism on that; he does the same thing to me. However, you’ve used your power on a mortal in the precinct and---”

“Going to fire me, Sam? This was _your_ idea. You begged me. It’s a terrible idea, but I said yes cause I don’t want Chloe and Ella with extra targets on their back. I’d _never_ want that. But the things Dan is saying aren’t true!”

Mostly, but some were so unflinchingly honest, Michael couldn’t bear to deal with them.

“But what you did was unwise.”

“You use your abilities every time I turn around---fix a parking ticket, charm a new headliner to sign for a night or two a week at _Lux_ , and of course get subjects to confess because Dad forbid you, Sammy, would _ever_ do paperwork or give a shit about procedure.”

“Yes, but…here what I do helps cases. What you did was disable a colleague.”

Michael snorted. “He might function better for a few hours if he doesn’t get distracted by the yapping sounds of his own voice.”

“You can’t leave him like this.”

“Why not? It won’t hurt him. I can un-Command it soon enough. Espinoza needs to---”

“What? He’s not in your legion, _Mikey_. You haven’t one. Let it go.”

Michael glared up at his twin, at his practiced calm and at his perfect suit and face and posture. At all the things, even now, Sam still had going for him. Yes, what he was underneath was the stuff of nightmares and elemental terror. But he could _hide_ it. Around mortals, Sam could pass as wonderful and charming and enticing. He was temptation incarnate, and how Michael envied him for it. Michael had none of those luxuries, and Espinoza had seized onto that easily, saw his chances to debase and insult him.

He _remembered_ all the eyes in the precinct on him barely a month ago, their measuring gazes as Daniel labeled him essentially _lesser_.

It was true, but a mortal had no place to say that to him.

“He pushed and pushed, Sammy. Let him have a few hours to think about what he’s done.”

His twin shook his head. “This is my home. I’ve allowed you to stay, and you’ve worked so hard with Linda and with me. Charlie genuinely adores you. I’ve rarely seen Miss Lopez as happy as she is now. But I don’t know why you can’t ignore the annoyance that is the douche currently, but snap out of it. We need to focus on this case and catch this monster as soon as possible. We haven’t time to poke at Daniel like this. If you want to prank him, then lace his pudding with something. It’s what half this floor does anyway. Don’t abuse your power on him. You know better.”

“You’re the one who broke every rule Father ever gave us, even the no-killing-humans-one. So what’s a bit of a prank today?”

Samael considered him and sighed. “Because you’re better than I am, your tantrum a few months ago aside, Mi. You’ve always been more controlled, more caring in your way. Lashing out at Daniel isn’t like you. So, Brother, what is it?”

Michael sighed and looked down at the table. His left hand was lying on it, but his right was hanging loosely at his side and hidden by the surface of the table entirely. “I am a fraud.”

“Well, you didn’t actually go to Oxford, but my guy is great and the paper trails he creates cannot be untangled. Your credentials will serve well enough for a department that hired the Sinnerman---the Original sinner no less---and had zero clue about it.”

“No,” Michael replied, sighing again. “I’m a fraud and the dullard can see through me. I started this life and my time on earth with a lie. I still don’t know why Chloe Decker doesn’t hate me more. Clearly, her offspring and her ex aren’t exactly fans.”

Samael surprised him by chuckling quietly. “The spawn is almost twelve, I believe. And she is more mercurial and confusing than even Rae Rae at her most excitable. Honestly, as things have settled she’s far more concerned about a new school mate who is trying to take her spot as a football team starter than she is about you at all.” Sam shrugged. “At least that’s what Mazikeen mentioned last.”

“Football?”

“Soccer, whichever,” Samael corrected, and Michael knows little of human sports anyway, but he finds it infuriating and so very Sam to keep his affected accent and diction so much that even with his own twin, Samael won’t just say the Americanism instead. “And the Detective knows what’s the greater good. You make Miss Lopez happy and you brokered the arrangement with Duma so I don’t have to rule hell for now. She’s grateful. Yes, you were an ass, but to be quite blunt, Amenadiel, Maze, and I have all taken turns testing the loyalty of our humans.”

Michael nodded. “I know but I---”

“Acted more like me than you’d like to admit when you first blew into Los Angeles?” Samael prodded.

“No, I…I can’t tell her, Sammy.”

His brother nodded, and, as always, they didn’t need their powers to work on each other in order to know everything about each other. Michael’s own conflicting desires must be written on his face and his very crooked posture after all.

“You feel like a fraud before Miss Lopez, and you yearn to let her know what you truly are.”

Michael glanced to the display on Ella’s windowsill, at the representation of the saint he _never_ was sitting there. “I can’t. Rules, right?”

And they both know that it was a lie. Amenadiel, the First Born who lectured since the dawn of humanity about letting the Divine and mortals mix, has a family of his own and a Nephilim son. Samael has never once told the humans he’s met anything but what he truly is, whether they choose to believe him or not. He has Chloe Decker and her daughter as well as Linda Martin by his side as allies. The rules are flexible, and they all know it.

The less said about their idiot little sister revealing herself to Ella, when his girlfriend was just a scared, injured child trapped in a car crash, the better.

But he just…

He couldn’t tell her.

Samael considered him. “Miss Lopez is one of the few truly good souls I’ve ever known. Linda and Chloe of course come to mind, and I wonder if, somehow, the Detective’s divine origins gave her a leg up on her selflessness, if only because it seems unnatural that someone could forgive me as much as she has. However, our forensic scientist friend…she could handle this.”

“I thought you and Azrael and Amenadiel said _no_ to me telling her. You were pretty vocal about it months ago at _Lux._ ”

Samael reached over and picked up a rosary draped over the edge of the sill, and Michael realized his brother was doing it if only to have something to do with his hands. All that constant nervous energy that his twin had struggled with even at the beginning of time.

“I know.”

“And Linda doesn’t think it’s wise.” He didn’t add that it was obvious that Linda was worried about Charlie’s safety in the full equation as well.

“Yes, but at first the three of us didn’t know what we had with you, if you were still dangerous when we confronted you with her and she’d bloody well tried to taser your arse. I know better now. I...” Sam passes the beads of the rosary between his fingers contemplatively. “…it took far too long to explain to the Detective all that I am. I regret how she found out, and I regret that she had to see my absolute worst side first before she understood me.” He guffawed then and the rosary almost fell from his grip. “Not that even after all that’s happened to me, I even understand myself.”

Michael could understand that. It confused him still to see what had become of his brother, at the nightmarish gargoyle shape inflicted upon him when Sam was truly upset and his subconscious ran amok.

He stood and limped to his brother’s side. The day had been emotionally taxing already, and Michael’s right side always grew weaker when he was under stress. Still, he understood the honesty Samael was offering him for what it was---a rare bit of trust. Reaching up, Michael gave Sam a quick pat on his shoulder but quickly dropped his hand again.

They were more similar than _either_ of them wanted to admit, and the hallmark of that was how _neither_ wanted to appear weak or to engender pity. Though, to be honest, between Michael’s broken body and the demonic side Samael kept hidden even from his closet and most beloved mortals, they both were.

Dear Father, how low the Demiurge had fallen.

And they’d done it to each other.

“You’re not awful when you change,” Michael offered.

“I’m something that can drive humans to madness with a glimpse. Make no mistake on that.”

Michael offered his brother a sly smile. “And yet, I do not think anything you can do can deter your miracle, Sammy. I’ve seen this one. She is so very fierce. Honestly, if she can deal with that idiot organizational system that Ella informed me included ‘hot suspects,’ then she can take some reddened wings and red eyes. Chloe Decker would much rather be functional at work than worry about the Devil in her life,” Michael finished, winking at his twin.

His brother brightened at that, and Michael was glad he could help. And even more relieved that Samael wouldn’t press him because as much as he was learning to trust Sam all over again, there was something utterly terrifying even to _him_ in Sam’s other side. Michael could not lie about that, and Sam would know.

He always did.

But he had no doubt after watching them together, that Chloe Decker could care less which shape Samael took. It was sweet and enviable, that level of trust and dedication they had for each other.

He desperately wanted that for himself and with Ella.

“But now that you’ve set down roots here, Mi, I trust you. If you feel it’s time to show all that you are---all we are really---to Miss Lopez, then I’m behind you. If Amenadiel wants to be a feathery prick about it, then I’ll talk with him and Linda both.”

Michael was pretty sure he imagined the red flare in Sam’s eyes.

Well, almost.

“I do want to but Linda says it’s a huge world view shift. I mean, she did go catatonic and Mom tortured her, and she almost died and Chloe found out about you and fled to Rome for a month.”

Sam’s posture grew tight and closed off. “And met a priest, believe me I know.” Samael tried to force a smile to his face, but Michael knew the false expression for what it was. It was _their_ face after all, and he knew all his own common tricks to hide his sadness. “Well, then, you should be rather relieved. There’s no equivalent for expelling archangels.”

“But Sam…what if I told Ella and she didn’t like me? What if even beyond the danger and the way it shocks humans to know we’re real—even humans of faith like Ella---what if she doesn’t love me back then?”

“Why ever wouldn’t she? She somehow finds you quite entertaining even though you prattle on about accounting more than any one ever should, which, honestly is sentence one about accounting and spreadsheets by the way.”

“Thanks.”

Samael studied him, sharp eyes highlighted just a bit with hellfire as if that would give him a more probing advantage. “If she can somehow find your personality enchanting, Mikey, then the added Celestial side should only make someone as devout as she is happier.”

“You know, you don’t have to rub in that you don’t get procedure or thorough work ethic or paying attention consistently. Some people really enjoy well-wrought and attentive calculations.”

Samael was always going to be his twin, always going to be as run by desire and impulse as Michael clung to expert control. “Yes, be still my heart. Tell me more about databases, Brother. You’re a veritable chick magnet; I can see it now.”

“I hate you too, Sam, you overgrown peacock.”

“Flash speaks for itself.” Samael sighed and pushed off from the desk to pace. “Why would it be worse to show her your true self then? If you hate feeling like a fraud?”

The air stilled in Michael’s rib cage, and he couldn’t speak at first. Eventually, he unfroze and gestured to the statue taunting him from Ella’s windowsill. “Because I am not _him_. I am not the Sword of God.” Michael stepped away from the desk and forced his wings out, grimacing at the way bones tore against bones in his left as he did it. “Because this is nothing but dull, broken quills and hobbled potential.”

Sam studied him and nodded. “It could be worse, and I won’t show you how. Not here, and put those away. I have the door locked and the blinds down, but we don’t need some accident and a human or three sacked out in the precinct in religious stupor.”

Michael swallowed and forced his wings back inside. A quick folding of them away was something he hadn’t tried in centuries, and he remembered why. It took the better part of ten minutes to get the left one to cooperate at all, and a horrifying pause in the middle of his efforts where his wing was half-in and half-out of his body, and even Samael’s implacable expression had gone slack and horrified to witness it.

But finally, the last grating of the bones slid into place, and his eyesores were gone again. Banished from the mortal plane.

“Mi? Are you alright?”

He snorted and half-sat and half-fell onto the nearest stool. “Operative question.”

His twin looked to the floor, and Michael understood why. It was hard to live with Samael’s mistakes---with the desperate grasp that had ruined him---but Sam needed to understand, even now, the depth of what he’d cost Michael. Let him see his ruined wings and pain, let Samael remember that he was _not_ blameless in the Rebellion no matter whatever other things the Devil told himself to sleep at night.

“I’m sorry, Mi. Truly I am.”

“I do not need your pity,” he bit back. “I had my orders and I followed them. You had your goals. This is what’s left of us, and I’ve spent too long bitter and lonely and fighting to keep miring myself in it.”

“I know but---”

“No, don’t.” Michael snapped. “We had our roles, and we played them. You’re no longer a real angel for your troubles and, in a different way, neither am I.” He sighed and tried to ignore the way his right side shivered. “No matter what, Sam, I can’t be what she needs. I cannot be the Great Judge or the Sword of God or a true archangel. I am just the shadow of it. Ella won’t…she’ll leave me.”

“You are selling Miss Lopez short, Brother.”

“I just can’t, Sammy. It’s safer for her if I don’t anyway, and I…” he looked up at his brother. “Who can love those wings? Who would even want to?”

“You are _definitely_ selling her short. She didn’t ask for St. Michael, leader of Father’s legions. She fell somehow for my idiot twin who was pranking her and wooing her---somehow---with nerd things.”

“Thanks there.”

His brother huffed. “You bloody well know what I mean. She doesn’t want an angel, but she does want you. If you’re open with her, that will be better for you both. Trust me,” and his eyes flared red again. “If you muck around with the truth for too long, you will hurt her, and she won’t accept you, and it will have nothing to do with your wings and everything to do with your deceit.”

“Your wings are beautiful. Even now!” Michael objected. “They were the most beautiful Father ever made, and while you have another pair, the ones I’m sure your detective sees most often are the ones all the Host _still_ envy. I can’t…I just can’t!”

Samael nodded. “I hope that eventually you can. I care about you both, especially Miss Lopez, who I am rather protective of. If you take too long to find a way to tell her, it will hurt her so very deeply. Figure it out.”

“You could just show her some red eyes, let her know you’re not method,” Michael snapped.

“I cannot because it’s a punishment, and this truth is between you and her, to be quite honest. Cain forced my hand and made me reveal my secrets to the Detective, more or less. Trust me, you don’t want Miss Lopez to find out because I’ve forced her hand in it. That bitterness is hard to break back down.” Samael turned to the door and unlocked it. “Figure it out, Mi. Because if you feel the douche has hit a nerve calling you ‘a fraud,’ then you must feel it too. And if you lead Miss Lopez around for too long---and do keep in mind she’s hardly a fool---then, truly, you are every bit the fraud you fear you are.”

His twin opened the door and gave Michael a final, red-eyed glance.

He couldn’t help the instinctive reaction, to answer his brother’s gaze back with a golden one of his own. “I will, okay? I just…I’m lucky she loves me at all.”

Sam shook his head. “Trust me. I know far too much about this, but Miss Lopez loves _the idea_ of you. Until she knows all of you, then she can’t love you the way you want. She can’t be happy the way she deserves.” There was such a sincerity in Sam’s tone that it took Michael back. He’d never been half as dear or affectionate toward Remiel or so many of their sisters.

Only…

“You care about her as much as Rae Rae, don’t you?”

“I do, and I don’t want her to suffer because of, well, us. So, get your problems sorted, Brother, and start with unscrambling the douche. He’s annoying, granted, but if you don’t want Ella to know all you are, then Commanding her colleague is a piss poor start to that.”

“Fine, I’ll go upstairs right now.”

“See that you do, and we’ll all go to the crime scene together. Let’s get this all done with and the killer caught as soon as possible. I’m starting to worry as brilliant as the Detective is that this was a mistake.”

“Don’t like the consulting competition?”

“I don’t fancy keeping you from smiting Daniel. Too tempting to help you, Mikey. Now, get to it. Put it right.”

And like the King he was, his brother stalked out of the room with shoulders held high and expecting his Will be done.

Michael hated that.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael fixes Dan's problem, and then goes to consult.

He took the stairs.

Michael wanted to drag out the time until he absolutely had to fix Espinoza. He had no interest in undoing the Command. Samael wasn't wrong. It had been impulsive and foolish, and Dad knew that his twin was an expert on those things. When even the Devil thought you were acting recklessly, then it had to be true. But the dullard had been pushing and pushing. It was easy enough to ignore it when Espinoza had assumed he was Sam. Sometimes, the dullard even voiced thoughts that Michael still held about his brother. But this was different. Ever since he'd become a fixture in Ella's life and come by the station for lunch with her or coffee as _himself,_ well Daniel couldn't resist egging on about Michael.

Yes, he'd been wrong to impersonate Sam. Yes, he was still getting some of Trixie's ire and the dullard's because he had. Even the hesitant friendship he'd struck with Chloe Decker for Sam's sake was tenuous at best. But Dad damn it, Michael was trying, and Espinoza repeatedly pointing out his weaknesses and his failings and how he was _lesser_ when he was not just an angel but an **archangel**. How dare the detective insult him like that. Michael felt awkward enough in his own skin; he didn't need the dullard digging at him, talking about how he was lacking.

He had that chorus in his head every day and had since the Fall.

Obviously, Michael wanted to extend it as long as possible, the release of his Command, because by the time he dragged his weak side up the two flights of stairs, he was panting and would have been sweating, had he been mortal. It was in that state that he met Chloe Decker. A Chloe who was glaring at him with enough annoyance and hatred to match her ex as she grabbed his arm and yanked Michael into the nearest conference room. 

He allowed the manhandling, but mostly because he'd overestimated his stamina on the stairs and was too tired to object. Once Chloe locked the door behind him, Michael offered her a shrug. ''You're going to cause a commotion and get rumors starting if you drag the wrong twin in here.''

''You know that's not what I was doing,'' she snapped.

Michael nodded. ''You wanted to talk to me about Dan.''

Chloe narrowed her eyes at him and continued to pace. ''Of course, I do. What am I supposed to...he can't talk! He can't make a sound. Dan's still in the conference room gaping like a fish, and Ella's freaking out. I am trying to keep him calm and throw her questions off track. I just...what did you do?''

''So you're not going to accuse Sam?'''

''His powers don't work like that, and we both know it. What did you do? I assumed you didn't have anything.''

Michael sighed and leaned against the nearest desk. ''We all do. Amenadiel stops time, or he did before he punished himself and made it all go away. Samael has desire, and I...I _Command_.''

She stopped pacing and set her hands on her hips. ''And what does that mean?''

He sighed and looked down at the tile beneath him. It was an unsightly ochre in some places, stained by age and spilled coffee, and as dreary as the file room and some of the other older places in the precinct. ''If I tell someone what to do, they'll comply. They can't help it. Any angel younger than I am who is not an archangel as well, any demon, and humans of course. I doubt you'd be susceptible since you can't be affected by Samael's sway over desire either. It's unclear, and I won't test it out on you anyway.''

''Gee, I'm so lucky, but now you've got my investigating teammate and the father of my kid out there unable to talk at all. Why didn't he get the same consideration?''

''He insults both me and Sam as much as he breathes. I was tired of all of it. Perhaps Daniel will be kinder when he has an inkling of exactly what he's dealing with. I don't like to use _Command_. I never asked for the power any more than Sam wants to control desire, not really. And I know it's invasive. Forcing anyone to do what I want, leaving them with no way to refuse. It's cruel. It's the most basic violation of free will. I understand why I was gifted it to run the Legions, but I don't...I haven't used it in nearly forty years, Chloe Decker, I swear it.''

She let out a long, tired sigh. ''Can you undo it?''

''Yes, I just _Command_ his voice back and problem solved.''

She glared back at him, her eyes like cool steel. ''You know, Dan will ask questions later.''

''Has he ever with Sam? Or with Amenadiel?''

''No, but after Charlotte...he has a bigger axe to grind. If you come here---when I vouched for you---throwing around Celestial powers. One day Dan will ask the right questions and stop being in denial. None of us want that.''

''I want the respect I'm owed. I have erred so much lately, but I still...'' Michael looked down at his right side and at his lame arm that hung there so limply. ''...I'm not _lesser_ and I am useful.''

Chloe Decker's expression softened, and she shook her head. ''Dan can be a lot to deal with. Believe me, there's a reason he's my ex, but you can't...my boss saw that. A half-dozen of our best detectives saw that. I know Lucifer is cavalier about if someone finds out he's actually the Devil, but you have more roots here now. All of you do. You angels might be invulnerable but Charlie's _not_. Besides, you're---''

Michael quirked his head at her genuinely confused at her tone. ''You're mad because you're worried about me, aren't you?''

''Kind of. I mean, yes, it wouldn't be great to invite the wrong detective to get too nosy. I don't know. Are you gonna tell me scientists aren't a concern?''

''I would merely move on,'' Michael said, shrugging. ''I have had a long four decades on earth so far. I've had a human ask too many questions a time or two. It's easy to reinvent myself.''

''But you wouldn't want to leave now, and Lucifer and Amenadiel don't. And then there's Charlie.''

Michael considered that. ''More ties to family means more vulnerability, more risks. I agree...I just...my idiot two months aside earlier, and I am sorry about that---@

''We do better when we try not to talk about that,'' she offered.

''Agreed, but Sam's the reckless one...or he _used_ to be. I don't act out or tantrum or get annoyed, but every time I see him Espinoza digs in about how worthless I am. It got to be too much, and I did something I haven't tried in decades. I just needed him to understand I'm not nothing.'' He forced himself to raise his hands, both of them, and gestured toward her. ''Samael wounded me grievously but I'm not helpless or a hindrance and Daniel treats me like I am.''

She nodded. ''I will talk to him about it. A lot. Maybe explain that I'll relate everything he does to antagonize our consultant to the lieutenant. He won't get away with all of this, Michael, I promise. But Dan I can handle. I can't cover for you if you start using your ability all over the station. Do you get the difference?''

He glanced back down at the linoleum. ''I do.'' Michael didn't face her as he asked the next question, something that had been teasing at the back of his mind since the detective had mentioned assuming he had no extra abilities at all. ''Did you think I couldn't have a skill like Sam did?''

''You hadn't used it before that I'd noticed in over four months, so, yeah, I assumed you didn't.''

''Did you assume that because I was weaker than my brothers?''

Chloe sighed again. ''Maybe. I'm not sure. I know better now, and I need you to fix this mess, to get Dan back to normal and make Ella less worried. I just...can you do that and I'll cover your trail?'' She surprised him by reaching out and setting her hand on his good shoulder. ''I promise not to underestimate you next time.''

He finally looked up at her and offered her a crooked smile. It always did that around his scar. ''Is that a threat or a promise?''

''Depends on how much you continue to break the rules. But if you don't _Command_ again, we won't have a problem.''

His smile widened at that. ''Agreed, Detective Decker.''

**

It took less than five seconds to realize he regretted instantly coming through the door into the conference room. The dullard was still sitting at his chair and sipping slowly on a solo cup of water. He was paler than when Michael had _Commanded_ him almost a half-hour ago. Ella was sitting next to Espinoza, whispering something soothing to him in Spanish that Michael had no hope of deciphering. That was for his twin, who was gifted with the ability to understand any language spoken by man. When she heard the door creak open, Ella turned to frown at him.

''I'm thinking of taking him over to the urgent care at least. I don't get what's wrong with him. I thought that maybe his throat was just so dry. I just...I'm worried.''

Michael shivered at her gaze, that fear there was something he'd never wanted to see on her face. It was one thing to see the suspicion there as at the carnival. It was something else to feel her eyes on his own and to realize that what he'd done had frightened her. It hit too close to the incident at _Lux_ with the taser, which Ella had been convinced was basically a fever dream. But it had happened, and Michael had been there. Now, she regarded him just as lost and, again, he was the one to blame.

''Let me have a look at him,'' Michael offered.

''I don't think this is an accounting problem or anything to do with swords either, Mike. This is medical and I've never even heard of laryngitis this fast acting.'' She patted Espinoza's shoulders again, and a small, ugly part of him was irrationally jealous. ''Maybe we can schedule the crime scene walk through in a few hours, just until we know Dan's okay.''

Michael would have objected first, but Espinoza beat him to it by pounding on the table and shaking his head back and forth. 

Ella dropped her hand and regarded the dullard. ''You look bad, dude. We really should see if your GP is busy if you can actually get in with like an urgent care. The ER would cost a ton and it's not life threatening, really, just mondo weird.''

Dan shook his head again, then rummaged through his jacket pocket and pulled out his phone. He typed fast and it must have been some voice memo program because the electronic voice answered for him:

_Don't do that. Get to the crime scene. I'll deal_.

'' _Eso no es un chiste. Debe ir al medico._ ''

The dullard rolled his eyes and typed again:

_I promise I will tomorrow if this doesn't get better._

Michael walked up to the table and set his good hand, palm flat on it. ''I can help. I...I have seen this before during one of my deployments.''

He figured it was a bad thing that he was getting so good at speaking around the truth as Samael did. Technically, he had seen this many times before on the field of battle, both with getting his siblings to comply with quick action and in forcing demons and other pantheons to submit to his orders. But of course, he'd let Ella draw whatever conclusions she needed to. Humans and their need for denial after all.

''Are you sure?'' Ella asked, hope coloring her voice.

Michael nodded. ''Give me and the du...Daniel a few minutes, please.''

Ella stood and nodded. ''Good point. I can go check how Chloe's holding up too. I'll be back. I...do you need more food or anything, Dan?''

The other man held his red solo cup up high. 

Ella smiled back, and yes, Michael was definitely jealous of their rapport. It bit at him, those thing Dan didn't have to bury about himself. The uninjured right side...some of the things he didn't have and couldn't offer himself.

''Cool, Dan. I'll get you water, no problem.'' She was out the door soon after, but his Ella did spare a moment to press her hand to Michael's good side as she did. ''Take care of him, please.''

''You have my word, Ella.''

Once she was gone, Michael sat down at the head of the table where the lieutenant had previously sat. ''You don't have the right to insult me. You understand that, right?''

Dan glared at him and Michael didn't need words to interpret the shock and anger in his gaze.

''Right. You and Sam have your own fight, and I don't understand all of it. But I'm _not_ Samael.'' Michael held up his hand even as Dan furiously typed at his phone. ''And I pretended once, but I regret that deeply, and I'll never do it again. It was wrong to be around Trixie and Chloe too under false pretenses, and I understand that you're angry. But I was never going to harm either of them, and I will never do that again. I...you can be angry about that, and I'm still trying to prove to the rest of your family that I'm a good man. I am, but I understand shattered trust is hard to repair. Just...if you have a problem with me, then you get to relate it to my deceit. It's not about my relationship with Ella or implying she settled. It's definitely not about digging at my injuries.''

Dan finished typing:

_Fuck you. Who do you think you are?_

Michael chuckled sadly to himself and leaned across the table. ''I have been many things, but once I was a damn good general, and I have broken beings that you can hardly fathom. You don't get to insult me again, dullard.''

More frenetic typing:

_You're as crazy as Lucifer_.

Michael shrugged. ''Depending on the day, I may be even more bent. You're lucky I promised Sam and Chloe both to help you.'' He stood up as best he could and forced himself to mimic Sam's posture, to assume all the authority of the Demiurge he still was. ''Daniel Espinoza, you may speak, but try not to forget who allows it.''

''You're such an asshole!'' The dullard gaped at his words, clearly insulting Michael was more reflex than anything else. But his voiced had been _Commanded_ to return and so now Dan was staring widely back at him. ''What the Hell?'' The detective was out of his desk in a flash, staring between them. ''What did you do?''

''I helped, Daniel. Maybe go grab some water for yourself and check in with Chloe. I have to get ready, and then we're going to the scene. I'm sorry I've wasted so much time already.''

''You and your brother are so weird. How did you do that to me?''

Michael shrugged. ''I didn't, but Sam's abilities are very much based in power of suggestion and neurolinguistic tricks. I know enough of my own. You just needed a prompt to get over your hysteria. Now let's get going.''

''No, this was different. This was something _wrong,_ way different from Lucifer's desire bullshit. I _knew_ it; I knew you were messed up.''

Michael stiffened, his immediate reaction made him think that the dullard was insulting his body, twisted as it was. But then he swallowed hard, thinking of his nephew and of showing off too much with his own powers instead. ''I'm not. I helped you right now. Just go see Chloe and calm down. The people the Santa Monica Sword Slayer is after need our help.''

Dan stomped his way to the door and grabbed the handle with a vengeance as he wrenched it open. ''I ignored so much of Lucifer's bullshit for so long because he grew on me and for a while I thought we were friends. That shit got Charlotte killed. _He_ got Charlotte killed, and you played around with my kid and my ex and their safety. I will find out whatever weird hypnotism crap you're pulling if it's the last thing I do. You get it?''

Michael sighed and leaned back in his seat. Suddenly, the idiocy of his fit of pique was finally hitting him. He hadn't...he just wanted the insults to stop. He didn't need a Greek chorus for them. Never had. And now, well, it was a good thing that the dullard was a horrific detective. If he was looking to prove that either he or his twin were something other, it would take the dullard a long time. Perhaps forever. Michael was pretty sure about that.

Espinoza had barely been gone for a few minutes before Ella returned to the room, water clutched in her hand. She blinked back at the hall and then at him. ''Dude, Dan tore out of here in like double time. What's going on? Did he get worse?''

''He's better. I talked him out of his panic attack or whatever you call this and he went to see Chloe. We can get ready for the crime scene now.'' He got to his feet and tried to walk past her, tried to exude an air of control over anything in his life currently.

''I didn't...he was shouting for Chloe as he hurried by, but I thought that meant a new symptom had come up. For like half an hour, he and I were trying everything we could think of. This makes no sense at all!''

''Does it have to?'' He asked, and even Michael could hear how desperate and small his voice sounded. ''He's fine now, and we have a serial killer to stop. Isn't that good enough?''

Ella paused and stared up at him, her look as intense as he had ever seen it when directed at a specimen under her microscope. He took a step back at the intensity of her glare. ''Did you do that to him?''

''Ella---''

''No. I try so hard, Mike, to turn a blind eye to things. I do. Because we finally got on the same page with everything, and I opened my big mouth like always early on and made you feel bad about yourself. I didn't mean it, and after everything on Luce's balcony...I don't want you to think I'm crazy. But I don't know what you want me to think. You say a few words and Dan can't talk and is freaking out. You say something else to him, and he's fine. I mean hella pissed, but he's fine.''

''Samael and I know a lot of tricks. I...it was wrong to do something similar to Sam's desire skills. It was, but it was like hypnotizing in its way.'' And Michael was getting far too deep an understanding for how easy it must have been for years to Sam to tell his miracle just enough but not everything about the truth. ''The things he says...I was _tired_ , Ella. I just was so tired.''

''I know, and I am going to have all the words with Dan. But this is more than a nightclub act. It was _stronger_ than what Lucifer does, well, except when he leaves people in the interrogation room screaming and catatonic. I...'' She paused then and stepped away from him. Michael wasn't even sure Ella realized she'd instinctively taken a few steps back at all. ''Can you do that too? Could you do that to me?''

He reached out with his good hand and stroked her cheek. ''I do not do what Sam does, and I can't. And Ella, I would do _anything_ before I let harm come to you, let alone do it myself. Ella, I just...it was a trick, a shitty, mean one, but that was all. A bit of neurolinguistic suggestion. That's all.''

She pulled away from him, and his heart ached at the loss of contact. ''Alright, say I believe you. Then what was the boardwalk? How could you break that game? I just...you and Lucifer are both weird, and I think it's more than nightclub tricks. Tell me what is going on!''

Michael opened his mouth and wanted to say everything right then, to tell her that he was _that_ Michael, though he'd never asked to be a saint, and that angels and demons and hell and the Silver City and _all of it_ were real. But he thought of his left wing, of the broken disappointment it was and the way most of his siblings stared right through him and some, like Remiel, treated him as if he'd Fallen too. He thought of Ella's eyes wide with terror and confusion at _Lux_ , and Michael just couldn't.

He couldn't disappoint her and since _all he was_ was a pure disappointment, then he couldn't tell her either.

''I know a few of Samael's hypnotism tricks. That's all this is. I would have given Espinoza another power of suggestion prompt soon. I just...please don't be mad.''

Tears welled in her eyes, and Ella wiped furiously at them. ''Let's just get to the crime scene, okay? I need to get pics of the evidence, and you need to...apparently you're a medieval weapons expert and then some because of course you are. What can't you do? Fly?''

Michael sighed and shoved his hands with some effort in his blazer pockets. ''Not anymore, and not for a very long time, at least not the way I'd have liked to.''

She didn't have an answer for that, just wiped her eyes dry and hurried out the door, leaving him alone. 


End file.
